80m and the USA: What's up with that?

Over the past couple of weeks, I've started being active on 80m for the winter time.  Using just a simple inverted L with two elevated radials, I've found myself up there with the best of the crowd. 

It's fascinating to run WSPR, a kind of personal beacon mode where unbiased, semi-objective signal reports are sent back to the user via the internet.  WSPR really does let you see how well your antenna is working, and whether that latest tweak made things better - or worse!

That's your American lot!  Not a lot of 80m WSPR interest, stateside.

It's really odd, therefore, that on 80m, there are only a handful - and by that I mean fewer than ten on most nights, active on WSPR from the US.

Why on earth might this be?  There's plenty of antenna design and construction activity, and tens of thousands of hams out there.

In many places, there are oodles of land and low winds to allow the erection of really very good, full-sized 80m antennas.

Sadly, they just don't seem to be there - at least on WSPR.  It's a big gap in our coverage, and it's to be hoped many more users across the US contribute to understanding their own antennas, those of others, and how the signal propagates between them.