Welcome. The Vankleek Hill Weather station sits on farmland, between the towns of Vankleek Hill and Alexandria in Ontario, Canada.
Weather here is challenging to forecast due in part to the the Laurentian mountain range to the north and our proximity to the mighty St. Lawrence river to the south and the Ottawa river to the north.
The site is near two important highways, along the border between Glengarry and Prescott counties, just inside the municipality of North Glengarry.
The 2013 National Housing Survey shows a surrounding population of 103,825. Many are farmers who must decide when to cut hay or schedule when to harvest, or plant crops. Ministry Of Transport surveys show traffic on Highway 417 between Ottawa and Montreal averages around 18,000 cars per day, while Highway 34 traffic between Vankleek Hill and Alexandria averages around 5,000.The closest public weather stations are roughly 80 km away.
Technology
This weather station has been operating in one form or another since 2000. Our latest online reporting unit is an Oregon Scientific WMR-968 wireless station operating with newly-installed Cumulus software. To improve accuracy the temperature sensor is located approximately five feet above a grassy area and protected by a homemade Stevenson screen. Our anemometer and wind direction sensors are located on a communications tower approximately 30 feet above grade. Our precipitation gauges are installed in accordance with National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Weather Service.
As they say on those TV infomercials: "WAIT THERE'S MORE:" Our Oregon rain sensor is continuously calibrated against a Stratus RG202 manual rain gauge that is calibrated to 1/100 inch.
Camera
Our weather camera points to the eastern skyline, in the direction of the city of Montreal, but the bottom of the image also captures a mixed deciduous forest typical for this part of eastern Ontario. In the lower foreground you can see a 17-acre field on the east side of the farm.
History
This site began as Amelia's Weather, a Radio Shack WX-200 unit, purchased on sale, as a Christmas gift in 2000, on sale, for around $100. As serious weather enthusiasts may recall this unit is identical to an Oregon Scientific WM-918 which became obsolete around 2003. The station used Andy Keir's excellent FreeWX software to compile and display data online. For many years, Andy, an Australian, relied on donations to operate a support site and was always willing to help fellow weather enthusiasts. Eventually a significant change in the Windows operating system ended further development on Andy's platform, but you will still find many great weather stations around the world operating with Andy's software.
Background
In the fall of 2013, Qaujimautik Systems installed a Hobo system from Onset with the following sensors: temperature, relative humidity (RH), photosynthetic active radiation (PAR), leaf wetness, barometric pressure, solar radiation and several sensors to be installed in spring 2014 (soil moisture content, soil temperature, rain gauge and wind speed/gust/direction) and an IP camera. The Hobo system is not currently reporting directly to this website but we are working an interface with our Linux-based web server. Our thanks to Qaujimautik's co-owner, Adam Lewis for his efforts and generous donations to this project. Qaujimautik sells and services Onset equipment and has installations in some very remote locations in Canada's north. Great people to work with!
With the exception of the rain gauge, which was damaged in an ice storm, our $100 Radio Shack equipment purchased 16 years ago, continues to operate well, but in August 2016 a terminal software bug appeared and that marked the end of its online presence.
Site Future
We will be adding sensors and upgrading equipment, in the coming years. Our wish list includes a lightning detector and Doppler radar (when we win the lottery) as well as two additional weather cameras.
We hope you enjoy the resources we have assembled here. Please bookmark this site and visit often. We would really appreciate your comments or suggestions for improvement.
Robert Irwin and Silvia Schaerer.
21400 Service Road Vankleek Hill, ON K0B 1R0
