BS: Signs of Spring

Subject: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Stephen L. Rich
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 08:11 AM

A little after 1:00 a.m. Saturday morning I saw my first sure sign that spring is around the corner. I saw a seemingly groggy rabbit. It hopped, rather shakily, up to within two feet of me (unusual for a rabbit). I'm inclined to think that it had quite recently emerged from hibernation because it gave me a look which seemed to say, "I just woke up! Who the hell are you?" Is the world ready for grumpy rabbits?

Has anyone else seen any signs of spring?

Stephen Lee

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Message transferred from a new thread on same subject. --JoeClone

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: *daylia*
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 09:12 AM

Here in Barrie On the temp was above freezing for the first time in months yesterday! Kids were running through knee-deep snow in their shorts, people outside in T-shirts celebrating. The streets look like rivers with the spring melt, my driveway is a treacherous mess of melting ice and mud right now but WHO CARES!! Bring it on ... spring is finally just around the corner!

I'm actually grateful for the heavy snowfall we got this winter - the water tables might rise to normal levels again. Water levels in the Great Lakes have been mysteriously dropping at quite an alarming rate over the last couple years. On the Trent-Severn waterway, some people's boats were sitting about 8 feet below the docks last year. Where has all the water gone?!? Some suspect the Great Lakes are being drained, the water sold to the US behind the backs of the Canadian public ... another conspiracy theory?

Oops I'm drifting - daylia

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: katlaughing
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 09:56 AM

Grackles about 2/3rds of the way down the page.

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: ced2
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 02:17 PM

Wow at 24 to the pie you'd need to do a lot of baking!

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Amos
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 02:41 PM

Well, if they're drinking up the Great Lakes, I think it qualifies under depredations, as discussed in Kat's link. Go get 'em, boys!

Or wasn't that the point? I'm confuzzled.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Walking Eagle
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 08:54 PM

I like to stand out in my yard of a night and gaze up at the stars. Took the neighbors a little time to realize this, but they now know that I'm harmlessly nuts so they expect just about anything out of me. I like to measure things a s well and I have measured Orion for a few weeks and he is on his way home from the hunt.

Horse blankets are coming off of the residents of the barns, they are shedding their winter coats.

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Ebbie
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 12:14 PM

I got a chuckle out of this New York Times editorial. I imagine a number of you can relate:

VERLYN KLINKENBORG
"I'd like to be able to hear the snow melting. A low whoosh would do, a sigh from the snowpack as it yields to the sun's insistence. I'd settle for a barely audible scream. The sound the snowmelt actually makes — the aural glittering of a dozen rills — is too diverting to suit my darker emotional needs. At our place, we had more than a hundred inches of snow this winter. It's not enough that it should melt. It should suffer as it melts. For the past five months I've walked back and forth to the barn over a sheet of polar ice. Now it groans as I step along it. I enjoy the sound. I send the horses up and down the ice sheet, then follow in the tractor. I'm breaking up winter while I have the chance..."

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: greg stephens
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 12:28 PM

WEll, here in Stoke the long-tailed tits have left the family groups they winter in and separated into pairs. The celandines opened this week, we've had daffs for a fortnight. The lungwort flowered today. An anenome yesterday. I've been taking my morning coffee outside for most of the last fortnight. yes. i think it's here. Yippee!!!!!
PS Don't think I'll bother putting out a humming-bird feeder.

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 12:48 PM

I've noticed the grackles cavorting coquettishly, and a few of them squabbling over nesting materials. We saw our first toad of the season outside the garage yesterday. The neighborhood redbuds have accelerated into spring after our ice storm of two weeks ago, and we can see that our little transplant redbud put in last summer didn't make it (or is marching to a much different drummer!). The new pines are busy putting up meristem material. Over the weekend we barbecued some chicken in a little informal brick fireplace I built last summer, and I noticed that something had toppled a couple of bricks in their enthusiasm to lick off the grill I forgot to bring in and wash. :-D

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 Mar 03 - 03:45 AM

Saw my first forsythia of the spring, today. It was glorious. While the rest of Colorado is getting from 2-8 feet of snow through Thursday night(!), we have coolish, cloudy days, my irises are starting to shoot up, the globe willows are topped with green buds making them look like giant umbrellas, and the birds are gathering nesting material left and right.

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Tinker
Date: 19 Mar 03 - 07:33 AM

We've had three unseasonably warm days. Actuallt saw 70F all three days. The snow has all disappeared, the iris, squill, and daffodill are all several inches high. Even the red peony buds are pushing up through the dirt. But beyond all of that, under a beautiful full moon the dog romped off last night and caught a skunk!! Today the temp is back to the forties and once I get folks off to school I get to wrestle 100 lbs of dog and tomatoe juice.... The sun still shines and the birds still sing...

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: gnu
Date: 30 Mar 03 - 06:44 AM

I saw my first robin just a moment ago. Poor bird must have missed the forecast for tommorow of freezing rain followed by snow. Mother Nature can be such a bitch, luring these guys in with mild temperatures and mostly bare lawns.

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Mar 03 - 11:44 AM

Well Gnu, I invited them to stick around for a little while. I even mowed the lawn yesterday (when the lawn is mowed, the table is set for the birds--they follow behind the mower catching liberated bugs). They're fat and sassy and ready to head north. Just remember--the first one doesn't make it spring (sorry for the paraphrase--I can't remember the exact Aesop quote--and isn't it for a sparrow or swallow?).

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Padre
Date: 30 Mar 03 - 11:59 AM

Well, fooled again. Today there are 4+ inches of wet snow on the ground, and some more coming down. The Alleghany Highlands sure know how to welcome Spring! But the weather forecast for later in the week is back up into the 60s.

Padre

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: *daylia*
Date: 30 Mar 03 - 12:04 PM

Threads like "Casual sex anyone??" on the Cat - a sure sign of Spring!

I saw my first robin on Friday, gnu - plump and rosy, happily hoppin about. But it snowed again last night, so the poor thing must be so disappointed ...

Maybe more of these hot spring threads'll help out a bit ... meeooww!

daylia

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: CarolC
Date: 30 Mar 03 - 03:39 PM

We're having a sign of spring that I've never encountered before. There is pine pollen coating the cars and trucks so thick, it looks like a fine dusting of yellow snow, or the dust that's left on cars after a dust storm in Oklahoma. It's a very strange thing to see.

Padre, are you in PA, western MD, or WV?

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: RangerSteve
Date: 30 Mar 03 - 06:55 PM

Last week we had more birds than just the solitary robin singing in the morning. Then the daffodils bloomed. The irises and tulips are coming up. I don't have to turn the light on when I get up at 5:30 in the morning anymore. I heard a cricket the other morning, although it was in my bathroom, not outside. Frogs have come out of hibernation since the recent Delaware River flood left plenty of ponds for them. It's a sound I love. We had the first thunderstorm of the year yesterday.

And today, it's snowing.

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Walking Eagle
Date: 30 Mar 03 - 08:35 PM

BASEBALL SEASON! YIPEEE!

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Troll
Date: 30 Mar 03 - 09:45 PM

The Azaleas and Dogwoods have bloomed and the Sandhill Cranes have long since departed for the northern nesting grounds. The oak pollen has turned everything yellow and my allergies are roaring right along.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: Bobert
Date: 30 Mar 03 - 10:02 PM

Wild flowers fightin' their way up. Yesterday, before today's 4 inches of snow here in the Blue Ridge Mt in Wes Ginny, I found several stands of "Blood Root" in full bloom, "Snow Drops", "Crokus" in bloom. The "native" azalea's are startin' to bloom. We have "Tooth Wart" up and "May Apple" pokin' up. The "Larkspur" is showin' as is my rare "Twin Leaf". "Dafoldills" are budded and right now covered with buckets to keep the freeze off then tonight.

The birds couoldn't care less about todays snow. They are moving into the nesting boxes and making nests in the evergreens. The male wren filled up one nesting box today hopin' to impress some lady wren. Them boy wrens ain't got a lick of sense! A titmouse has started making a nest not 20 feet from my bedroom. Oh goodie! "pswittt, pswittt, pswittt" for the next two months. Awwww, I don't care! It's spring and I'm in love with the P-Vine! Right? Don't get no better than that!

pswitt, pswittt, pswittttttt......................

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: gnu
Date: 31 Mar 03 - 05:33 AM

6mm of ice on everything and snow expected this afternoon. Thank goodness my first job today is only a mile down the road. The poor robins and their friends are going to have a hard day of it. I threw a bunch of bread under the leeward eve of the house, but the robins will have to chip through the ice to get the worms stuck on top of the pave. I imagine they'll be hard to swallow.

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: MMario
Date: 31 Mar 03 - 08:43 AM

yup - a day of heavy driving rain followed by four inches of snow - a sure sign of spring in these parts.

Subject: RE: BS: Signs of Spring
From: gnu
Date: 31 Mar 03 - 01:50 PM

ENOUGH !!!! The top three sets of branches on my beautiful white pines are saggin like bog spruce branches. And the wind's pickin up. Old Man Winter must be pissed about sommat.