Or ‘mares tails’ elongated filaments, straight or slightly curved, without clumps or mounds on their upper sides … paraphrased from The Cloudspotter’s Guide by Gavin Pretor-Pinney.
Insert: What I forgot to say yesterday, is that mares’ tails are ‘higher level’ clouds that occur in the 5 to 14 kilometer (16k feet to 45k feet) outer layers of clouds.
They’re made up of ice spiccules that fall up there and evaporate well before they reach the ground. And, despite that these clouds look immovable, they’re speeding along at 160 kilometers or 100 miles per hour.
I was glad to see them, because up to now there have been days and weeks of the cumulous type clouds that are part of the rainy season.
Now, finally, it seems, we’ve progressed into autumn/fall. Cooler nights and days, ranging from 18C at night to about 28C in the daytime.
Rita de Heer 