Finally? spring? #phenology

We finally seem to have moved away from a persistent threat of overnight frost. Highs in the sunshine are now in the upper sixties. Yesterday we saw a large garter snake sunning in the roadside ditch (a much safer location than on the road itself). Today we noticed the first dandelion puffball of the year. There are still many, many, yellow flowers, but an early starter has already set seeds. Speaking of seeds, many of the local farm fields are in the midst of being planted. Tractors, harrows and planters are cluttering the local roads and slow-moving semis are hauling last year's grain someplace.

Today we observed, for the first time this year, a male ruby-throated hummingbird. It was at the front feeder. He may have been here before, but we couldn't see any ruby-red throat feathers until this morning. Late yesterday the downey woodpeckers kept startling hummingbirds away from the big nectar feeder hanging from the deck railing.

male rose-breasted grosbeak

Photo by J. Harrington

Male goldfinches have, for some time now, been wearing chrome yellow mating colors. When they share the feeders with male rose-breasted grosbeaks, it looks like someone spilled a box of bright-colored crayons on the perches.

The Farm

By Joyce Sutphen

My father’s farm is an apple blossomer.

He keeps his hills in dandelion carpet

and weaves a lane of lilacs between the rose

and the jack-in-the-pulpits.

His sleek cows ripple in the pastures.

The dog and purple iris

keep watch at the garden’s end.

His farm is rolling thunder,

a lightning bolt on the horizon.

His crops suck rain from the sky

and swallow the smoldering sun.

His fields are oceans of heat,

where waves of gold

beat the burning shore.

A red fox

pauses under the birch trees,

a shadow is in the river’s bend.

When the hawk circles the land,

my father’s grainfields whirl beneath it.

Owls gather together to sing in his woods,

and the deer run his golden meadow.

My father’s farm is an icicle,

a hillside of white powder.

He parts the snowy sea,

and smooths away the valleys.

He cultivates his rows of starlight

and drags the crescent moon

through dark unfurrowed fields.

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