~
Friday, April 30, 2010, 8:00 a.m.
50 degrees, calm, mostly cloudy
This is a beautiful calm morning, the sky overlaid
by clouds but bright to the east,
with a little milky blue showing to the north. There is
not even a whisper of a breeze,
and the branches of the poplar tree outside the window
droop gracefully with their array
of long green blossoms and tiny new leaflets. A pair of
bluebirds perches on the forked stick
hanging on the old clothesline; they have been taking
turns swooping down to the lawn to pick
up a little nosh from the dew-spotted grass. This is the
last day of April, and tomorrow will be
May Day. Make sure to go outdoors early to gather some of
the fresh morning dew to splash
on your face, to help keep you young and beautiful for
the rest of the year. Pick some flowers
for a May basket while you are at it, and give it to
someone you love; I have been doing this
since I was six, and first learned of it at school.
Spring has come early this year, and there is
a huge array of flowers from which to choose. Bluebirds
have nested early as well; one of
our boxes already contains three aqua blue eggs.
Yesterday I planted some carrots and
parsnips, and even though Tuesday’s little snowfall
is all of the precipitation we have re-
ceived lately, the soil was damp after I raked away the
top layer to sow the seed. It was
a very windy day, and I had to cover the big lightweight
parsnip seeds as soon as I placed
them in the furrow, or they would have been swept away.
Carrot seeds are smaller and more
dense, so those stayed put. We picked a gallon of
fiddleheads from the hedgerow and I cleaned
and blanched them all, using about half of them in a
creamy pasta carbonara, pungent with a whole
bulb of garlic and a fistful of chopped wild leeks. The
rest of them will be served with tonight’s meat-
loaf, with a little butter, salt, and pepper, as fine a
side dish as any tame vegetable. There are very
few little fiddleheads emerging, and as the day warms up
they will all slowly unfurl into the lovely
ferns that are their final state. The fiddlehead season
is all too short, and I haven’t had much
luck freezing them for later. I have seen them sold in
cans, but I’ll bet they have as much
appeal as canned asparagus, slimy green and bland, ugh.
Fresh is always best !
Have a lovely day,
Daisy
Thursday, April 29, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
46 degrees, windy, sunny
The wind is still from the northwest, and not
especially spring-like. The sun is strong,
however, and I have a feeling that by the time May
arrives this weekend we will be wishing
for this wonderful fresh breeze to help sweep away the
biting bugs of the season. Yesterday’s
snow melted quickly and our lovely flowers are once again
standing at attention, harmed not
one whit by the icy flakes that blanketed them. We have
been watching a grackle family that
has nested in one of our backyard spruce trees; they must
have young in the nest, as they
have had quite a time chasing away a rogue crow that has
been very persistent in trying
to invade their space. Grackles appear from all
directions to peck at the bigger black
bird, and so far he hasn’t been able to do any harm
(that we can see anyway). I en-
joy crows, but this one needs to find his breakfast
somewhere else. This looks
like a good day to plant carrots, and maybe some parsnips
as well.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Wednesday, April 28, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
39 degrees, windy, partly sunny
We awoke to an inch of wet sticky snow that has already
mostly disappeared
in the intermittent warm April sun. I am confident that
our daffodils and tulips will
bounce right backup as soon as they lose the weight that
has bowed them right down
to the ground. We had snow for most of the day yesterday
but it didn’t start to stick until
the sun went down. There is a full moon tonight, and
clear skies in the forecast, so it may
get even colder than last night’s low of 31 degrees.
The wind is pretty fierce, coming right
out of the north, so even though it is growing sunnier by
the minute, don’t underestimate
the effects of the canadian clipper and dress in layers
if you are headed outdoors. On
the upside, I imagine that there are entire swarms of
black flies that have been smacked
flat by this little taste of winter. It is hard to
imagine that we will be in the seventies by
the weekend, but that’s how we roll here in the
North Country. Don’t like the weather?
Wait five minutes. I would like to close with a poem from
Ralph Waldo Emerson,
who speaks here of his wildflower garden:
Self-sown my stately garden grows;
The winds and windblown seed,
Cold April rain and colder snows
My hedges plant and feed.
From mountains far and valleys near
The harvest brought to-day
Thrives in all weathers without fear,—
Wild planters, plant away!
Have a great day,
Daisy
Tuesday, April 27, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
31 degrees, windy, cloudy, snow
If the meadows were dun brown instead of emerald
green I would imagine this
to be a November morn instead of the tail end of April.
Snow is skittering sideways,
borne on a northwest wind that has all of the bite of
winter and none of the promise of
spring. In spite of the raw conditions, a flock of
turkeys has fanned out across the lower
field, with four toms vying for the attention of twenty
hens, gobbling and strutting as proud
as any Chippendale’s dancer. We have both wood
stoves fired up, so we are toasty indoors,
and have the sunporch door flung wide open so that our
vegetable seedlings can have the benefit
of the wonderful warmth radiating from our old-fashioned
appliances. It is an excellent day to remain
inside to bake some cookies for the upcoming Turin
Village Library bake sale this Saturday. The weather
is supposed to be more moderate by then, and it should be
a perfect day for the village-wide yard sales,
with a book, craft, and bake sale at the fire hall, not
to mention the chicken barbecue at lunchtime.
If you find yourself in the general area of Turin, stop
in for some great bargains and tasty treats.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Monday, April 26, 2010, 8:00 a.m.
50 degrees, calm, mostly cloudy
Although we had a few promising little sprinkles
last night, we still haven’t had
enough rain to make a difference in a long time.
Yesterday we emptied our portable
water tank onto the strawberries, onions, and baby greens,
and this morning the lettuce
and spinach have doubled in size. We took the tank to the
spring overflow to refill overnight,
so it is ready to soak the raspberries and asparagus
today. We were happy the rain held off for
the greater part of the day, as we had a wonderful bike
trek over back roads and logging trails. Since
we have had such a dry spring, I was certain that one
particular forest path that is nearly always very
muddy might be rideable. I was quite wrong; what mud we
didn’t try to ride through (sometimes with
hilarious results) we carried our bikes around, creating
the new sport of backwoods bike-and-hike.
While afoot, we reveled in the vast amounts of tiny pink
spring beauties, velvety soft maroon trilliums,
and lemon-yellow trout lilies nodding amidst their
dappled foliage. We could see huge stretches of
black moldy leaves where former muddy bogs had been, but
there were still stretches of trail that
were gooey enough to make the outing memorable on many
levels. We stopped to admire an
old beaver pond, but didn’t see any beavers, busy or
otherwise. Black flies were swarming
but not biting, so they were merely annoying if we paused
for very long. We exited the
woods road onto the Plummer Road, and continued the ride
along the dusty back
roads of Tug Hill, a wonderful way to enjoy an afternoon
with friends. It looks
like the next precipitation we may see will be in the
form of snowflakes;
gotta love a North Country April! Maybe the black flies
will freeze.
Have a wonderful day,
Daisy
Sunday, April 25, 2010, 7:00 a.m.
44 degrees, breezy, mostly sunny
What a beautiful day! I couldn’t help but notice how
very early the sun has
been rising lately, just a little past 6:00 this morning.
There are a few high clouds
in a pale blue sky, and although there is a chance of
rain later, the radar shows that
it may stay well south of our neighborhood. That would be
a good thing; although we
surely do need some rain, if it would hold off until
after today’s bike ride that would be fine.
Friends are coming from all directions to get in the
first good ride of the season, and while
we have done so in the rain before, our brakes work ever
so much better when they are
dry. We filled the water wagon yesterday and are prepared
to spray the strawberries if
we don’t get some rain soon. We picked a good amount
of fiddleheads yesterday, and
my offering for today’s potluck supper will be the
much-anticipated spring pie,
filled with wild leeks, sorrel, dandelion greens, cattail
shoots, fiddleheads,
and home-cured bacon all in a cheesy egg base. Yum!
Have an excellent day,
Daisy
Saturday, April 24, 2010, 9:00 a.m.
58 degrees, breezy, sunny
Q: What is better than sitting on the sun-drenched
back porch with an ex-
cellent cup of french roast coffee listening to the sweet
songs of a catbird ?
A: Sitting on the sun-drenched back porch with an
excellent cup
of french roast coffee listening to the sweet songs of two
catbirds !
They are in full-tilt mating mode, each one trying to
outdo the other
with their lovely repertoire of other birds’ songs.
They opened with the
whistled notes of the male cardinal, and it got more
complex as the morning
wore on, and soon they were imitating each other. All
other birdsong, including
the enchanting parental gargle of a raven circling the
hedgerow were overshadowed
by those of the catbirds. They were both perched in the
big forsythia bush at the corner
of the garden, and they twitched their tails fetchingly
as they sang; this movement gave away
their location. They are hardly ever seen out in the open,
preferring to hide in shrubs and small
trees. A catbird will croon the individual song only once,
while a mockingbird will repeat it three
or four times before moving on to the next selection. As
beautiful as the catbird’s mating songs are,
their nasal monotone bleat while raising their fledglings
is most annoying, as it is often repeated for
hours as they watch over the youngsters. We have a fine
start to this beautiful day, and I look
forward to working in the garden with such a fine
soundtrack to keep me company.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Friday, April 23, 2010, 8:00 a.m.
42 degrees, breezy, sunny
The sun feels nice on this chilly morning. Frost
covered every vehicle in the yard
before dawn, and the birdbath has a thin layer of ice
that is rapidly melting. We tilled up
a couple more rows in the garden yesterday and today will
plant carrots and beets for the
first harvest. Our biggest carrots are planted in April,
and we sow some in May and June as
well, to keep us in fresh carrots for much of the summer
and for winter storage as well. We are
still enjoying last summer’s carrots, packed away in
bins with dried maple leaves between the layers.
They are not very good raw at this point, but still tasty
in potroast, stew, soup, or sautéed with a little
olive oil and maple syrup as a side dish. Yesterday was a
cold windy day, and we kept both fires burn-
ing so that we could come in and warm up as we went about
the minutiae that makes up outdoor work
this time of year. We have tuned up the lawn mowers,
mounted the plows on the tractor and done some
garden plowing for neighbors, pulled weeds, sorted and
sharpened tools, repaired the bridge that the town
snowblower ate, picked flowers, and moved wood (ongoing
it seems) and that was just yesterday. There
was still enough time to take the dog around the meadows
so he could romp around unleashed, master
of his lush world, leaping instead of walking, zigzagging
all over the place as he pursued some little ro-
dent’s lingering scent. Trout lilies have bloomed,
and I believe that fiddleheads will fairly leap out of
the ground as the day warms up. There is a very small
window of opportunity for gathering fiddle-
heads, especially if warmth and rain arrive at the same
time as they are developing. I believe
we shall be enjoying a fiddlehead and wild leek pie
before the weekend is over.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Thursday, April 22, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
44 degrees, windy, partly sunny
A few drizzly bits skittered across Gomer Hill
earlier, but as soon as they hit the ground
they evaporated. There is a good stiff west wind which
will only dry things out more. We
plowed some new garden space for a neighbor yesterday and
the soil is dry as a bone as far as
the blades would bite. We have put off tilling most of
our gardens, waiting for some much-needed
rain so the wind won’t whisk away the rich topsoil
it has taken us thirty-odd years to build up. Of
course, with rain will come weeds, and we want to turn
those back into the ground as soon as they
sprout. Our garlic patch has about a zillion baby dill
plants, progeny of the row of plants that weren’t
completely harvested last fall. If I dig out a clump
before we till that area, I can replant them in a nice
neat row later. I was right about the black flies; as we
piled wood under a hot sun yesterday, the first
of those pests gathered around the edges of our specs and
hid under the neckbands of our sweatshirts.
As black flies go, they weren’t too bad, but I am
sure they were just the advance scouts for a much
bigger swarm. Today is Earth Day; take a moment to clean
man-made artifacts away from your
little patch of Mother Earth. I am still picking up
debris left by all of the snowmobile traffic of
the past year, and have been doing so for the past month.
now that the nickel deposit applies
to non-carbonated beverages I may actually start to see a
little of that fabled huge revenue that
the sport brings to the North Country every winter. This
is the first year I haven’t found anything
good on the trail, no wrenches or flashlights, no cell
phones or tool kits. Mostly what I find is bits
of broken snowmobile and scads of empty Lite beer cans
and plastic water bottles. Meanwhile,
if any of you weekend folks are looking for a way to give
something back to our little town,
the Turin Fire Department is having a Hunter’s Feast
this Saturday, April 24th at the fire
hall. The event startsat 5:00 with an auction and a
buffet dinner at 7:00. The $30.00
admission includes a chance to win a rifle and other door
prizes. This will be a big
fundraiser for the fire department this summer, and it
promises to be a lot of fun.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Wednesday, April 21, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
58 degrees, calm, mostly sunny
Two tom turkeys have commandeered the morning with their
resonant gobbling
and arrogant displays of manly prowess. They circle each
other with loud threats
and killer fluffy chests, all bluff and bluster, like a
couple of fourth grade boys in an
I-know-you are-but what-am-I standoff. Funny thing,
we can’t see any hens around
to appreciate the show. Perhaps it is just a rehearsal.
There is no breeze this morning,
which is unusual, and it is already a nice warm day.
There is just a little chance of rain
for later, not enough to plan the day’s activities
around the weather. We have some
firewood to stack, and it wouldn’t surprise me if
black flies chose this nice warm
quiet day to show their pointy little faces. So far we
have been bug-free and un-
hassled by biting insects as we go about our outdoor work
and play. Time to get
out the jungle hats and aromatic balms to keep the little
bloodsuckers at bay.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Tuesday, April 20, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
56 degrees, breezy, sunny
Ah ! What a beautiful morning ! The breeze is soft, the
sun is warm,
and if I didn’t have so much to do I would still be
sitting on the back porch
watching the dog putter around. The lettuce and spinach
are up and need to have
their first thinning. Here is an interesting fact: I
planted spinach in a flat and put it on the
sunporch two weeks earlier than I planted seeds outdoors.
The indoor seeds germinated
very poorly, and only five plants emerged from the
potting mix out of fifty seeds sown. The
long row of spinach outdoors is crammed thickly with
little seedlings; it looks like every single
seed sprouted. I think the sunporch may have been too
warm to allow for optimal germination,
for spinach anyway. Apparently it prefers cold and wet to
warm and moist. I will thin out both
lettuce and spinach to stand an inch apart for now, and
in two weeks we will be able to pull
every other one and eat them as tender spring greens. The
thinning will continue until there is
a foot between each lettuce plant (more for the iceberg
variety) and eight inches between
the spinaches. It will be warm enough today to get out on
my bicycle for a little ride,
and the back roads are dry enough that I should be able
to go just about anywhere.
Don’t you love this time of year?
Have a great day,
Daisy
Monday, April 19, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
40 degrees, breezy, partly sunny
More clouds have moved in from the north since the
sun came up in a mostly clear dawn,
and the bits of blue that show are an unusual bright hue,
a little bit more turquoise then sky blue.
A huge dark form moved slowly across the east meadow at
first light, and at a glance I thought
it must be a bear, newly emerged from hibernation. A
closer look proved it to be a tom turkey,
as fluffed and fanned as I have ever seen, making him
appear to be at least twice his normal size.
He was strutting in silence; probably the effort of
maintaining such a display had temporarily rob-
bed him of his voice. We worked in the woodlot yesterday,
cleaning up the last bits and pieces
of some big poplar trees that were in the way. Poplar
burns fast and leaves a lot of ash, which
makes it unpopular as fuel. However, when mixed with
harder wood, such as maple or cherry,
it has the ability to warm the house very quickly and is
also good for bringing the oven up to
pizza-hot mode in the Kalamazoo range. The wood is pale,
almost white, and sometimes
has a bright orange streak right at the heart. It is
mostly straight grained and splits very
easily; I’ll bet it would make very pretty furniture.
We worked in comfort, dressed in
layers and warm gloves, as the day, not all that warm to
begin with, cooled down
quickly as the wind shifted from west to north. It looks
like the coming week
will be warm but not hot, and a little chance of rain
shows up now
and then, perfect weather for the middle of April.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Sunday, April 18, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
34 degrees, breezy, mostly cloudy, rain/snow
We arose to a bit of snow on the cars and blown into
hollow spots and odd corners.
Then a short rain shower took it away, but now and then a
few flurries appear out of the
drizzle. I guess this is how the day will go, a little
argument between Old Man Winter and Maia,
the Greek goddess of spring. Yesterday was cold and
flurries appeared off and on all day long.
Late in the day the wind picked up and the sun came out
for a brief but stunning appearance,
and we bundled up and walked up the Smith Road for a
while. Protected from the wind by
tall trees, I soon shed my outer layer and it felt like
spring again for most of the trek. The last
half mile we were awash with big wet snowflakes, and I
wished I had worn a warmer hat. I still
haven’t seen any trout lilies blooming on the Hill,
but friends report that they have been around
for about a week in the valley. I found some pussy
willows that were small but still perfectly
fuzzy, while most larger species have gone far past the
catkin stage. I saw dandelions in the
village, but none up here yet. Since Friday’s rain,
the onion sets in the garden have sprouted
at least an inch of greenery from their pointy little
heads, and have finally put down the first
roots that will draw nourishment from the soil. Now some
fog has appeared, so neither
snow nor rain has won the bicker; perhaps the fog means a
truce has been declared.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Saturday, April 17, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
34 degrees, windy, overcast, snowing
It is very interesting that the snow doesn’t seem to
have slowed down the grackles,
blackbirds, and starlings in their morning foraging
activity. The meadows are filled with
these hardy birds, and it is business as usual even if it
resembles November more than April
at this point in the day. We had some good rain showers
during the past twenty-four hours,
enough to water the new plantings but scarcely enough to
penetrate very far into the dry
dirt. We went to Saquoit yesterday to pick up some
certified seed potatoes, and it rain-
ed very hard south of here for most of the afternoon.
When we returned home, the
pavement on Gomer Hill had already dried out. Gusty wind
drove more rain
hard into the siding during the night, and now it is
snowing.
Just a typical April day here in the north country !
Enjoy your day,
Daisy
Friday, April 16, 2010, 8:00 a.m.
52 degrees, windy, mostly cloudy
I hope these clouds are carrying some much-needed rain !
We only had a few sprinkles yesterday, not even enough to
settle the dust. We hopped on our bikes for the first
ride of the
season, and went about nine miles in all, sticking mostly
to dirt roads
and old farm trails. Traffic was very light, consisting
of industrial trucks
and the odd tractor or three. Every time something passed
by it raised a
heck of a cloud of fine Tug Hill dust, so whenever we saw a
vehicle coming
we took a deep breath of clean air and held it as long as
we could. The road
surface was as good as it gets, not too rough with few
patches of sand or big
stones. It felt good to be self-propelled, speeding along
down the hills and
cranking hard to get the uphills out of the way in a
hurry. The weather was
perfect as well, not too hot, with just enough sunny
breaks to cast sparkling
ripples across the streams and vernal ponds that we
passed along the way. Just
after we returned a brief downpour looked promising, but
it ended as quickly as
it started, barely even moistening the driveway. If
today’s rain doesn’t pan out, we
will have to haul water to the strawberry patch and
asparagus beds. Garlic should
be okay under its thick layer of straw mulch. The stems
are over six inches tall
so far, and every clove looks like it has emerged in fine
shape. Maybe I
will get out the rain stick and give it a gentle shake or
two; can’t hurt !
Have a great day,
Daisy
Thursday, April 15, 2010, 7:30 a.m.
48 degrees, breezy, partly sunny
Sunrise was very colorful this morning, and there were
only a few clouds
in the sky at that time. Now a grey sheet of rain clouds
slowly encroaches from
the west. The forecast is for widely scattered showers
later today, but these clouds
look like the real deal to me. We certainly could use
some rain; we harrowed the potato
field yesterday, and the soil is dry as dust. Lettuce and
spinach seedlings could use a good
watering, and many of our onion sets have heaved up out
of the rows; they have good green
shoots on top but not much for roots. We cut some
firewood yesterday, mostly poplars that
had blown down during the winter winds and a few cherry
trees leftover from last autumn’s
project. It was a perfect day for being in the forest,
breezy and warm, with not a biting in-
sect in sight. There were dozens of mourning cloak
butterflies getting busy, joining in mid-
air for the briefest of flings. These butterflies do not
migrate, but crawl into a sheltered
spot and overwinter, coming out in March to warm up in
the spring sun and perhaps
sip a little sap to sustain their mating activities. I
saw several of these striking beau-
ties on yellow birch trees that were oozing amber drops
of sap from the bark.
To learn more about these native critters, check this
site: naturenorth.com
.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Wednesday, April 14, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
54 degrees, breezy, sunny
It is already warmer than yesterday’s high of fifty-three
degrees,
although the northwest breeze lends a little bite to the
morning air.
No clouds mar the blue sky, and the meadows are
beautifully green
with all of the colors made more vibrant by the liberal
scattering of dew-
drops across the land. Each globe of water acts as a lens
to magnify the hues
and as the breeze ripples across the grasses the whole
field shimmers and shines
with a pure radiance born of the joining of water and
lowly weeds. Every so often
conditions are just perfect for some real ah-hah! moments
here on Gomer Hill; it is
mornings like this that I reflect upon when the fog
descends or rain and lowering clouds
dull the scenery. A single gossamer strand of spider silk
spans a forty foot gap between
the lilac thicket and a poplar tree; it sways gently as a
hammock in the breeze. I can’t
begin to imagine how a spider managed to extrude that
thin thread for such a great
distance. No matter what catches my eye outside the
window this morning,
my gaze is always drawn back to that miracle of
engineering;
its size and strength relative to the small body of a
spider
are amazing. I need to go have a closer look !
Have a great day,
Daisy
Tuesday, April 13, 2010, 8:30
a.m.
45 degrees, calm, partly sunny
This morning’s still calm air is very unusual for
Tug Hill, where a breeze blows most of the time.
There are many insects passing by my window, flying
slowly like small moths, which may be exactly
what they are. They are too big to be black flies, and
too fast to be mosquitoes; thankfully, I haven’t
seen either of those hungry little bloodsuckers yet this
spring. Yesterday we walked up the Evans
Road to gather fragrant double daffodils from around the
old farmstead foundations, and passed
by a fresh manure heap that was teeming with stable flies.
The crocuses and windflowers have been
attracting bees to the flower beds, and houseflies form
living curtains on the sunny spots of the barn
siding on a windless day like this. There have been very
few ladybugs this spring; usually by mid-April
I have had to vacuum them from the window casings at
least once a day to keep ahead of their legions.
Perhaps they didn’t survive the winter. We have
gathered our first wild leeks, even though it is a little
soon; they could use another week before being at their
best. I chopped up a good handful and made
a very zippy salad dressing by combining equal parts
olive oil, cider vinegar, organic ketchup, raw
sugar, and leeks. Shake it up and you have an
unforgettable pungent dressing for any kind of green
salad. Add some bourbon and a bit of soy sauce, and it is
a grand marinade for pork or chicken.
Any time you choose to eat leeks, especially raw, it is a
good idea to carry some mints if you
will be among the general population; the aroma does
linger, and is not easily brushed away.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Monday, April 12, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
43 degrees, breezy, sunny
The sun has quickly dissipated the bits of frost
that formed overnight,
and left a thick layer of dew that was icy cold on my
sandal-clad feet as
I followed the dog around earlier. I know, I know, I
really should take the
time to slip into actual shoes before heading out first
thing in the morning, but
I honestly only ever intend to take a short turn around
the yard. Sometimes, the
dog gets on a scent trail, and I follow him as he follows
the whiff, to help keep him
out of trouble. I would hate to deny him his watchdog
duties, which include protecting
us from wild animals that have the nerve to trespass on
our land. On the other hand, he
only weighs nine pounds, so if there is a big rabid
raccoon or slow-moving porcupine at
the other end of the trail, I need to be there to call
him off. So far the prey has always been
some small rodent that has either escaped into a tree or
burrowed into the turf, at which point
he lifts his leg on the tree or the tuft of grass and
trots back up towards the house for his break-
fast. Occasionally he will burrow down a few inches and
snag a mole, vole, or shrew, give it a
quick shake, and carry it around for a while as a trophy.
If it’s a meadow jumping mouse, he
will try to eat it, but as he lacks the sharp teeth
needed to rip it into more bite-sized chunks
that hardly ever works out. I think he must have lived on
mice when he was wandering
around on his own over twelve years ago, when he showed
up on our porch all rag-
gedy and flea-bitten. He is now a fine healthy little
mutt, but still likes to play his
old survival games, hunting for food, rolling in
unspeakable things to mask
his scent, marking his territory and alerting us of
danger, real or imagined.
He may not be very big, but nonetheless he is a real
wonderdog!
Have a doggone good day,
Daisy
Sunday, April 11, 2010, 9:30 a.m.
44 degrees, windy, partly sunny
Oh! What a glorious day ! We have that rare quality of
light that occurs
when the air is clear and big clouds part from time to
time to cast the brightest
of sunshine all over the land, putting every detail into
super-sharp focus; the forsythia
practically vibrates with a yellow not on the normal
color wheel. The wind bites, mostly
from the west, but with a northern edge right out of the
Arctic Circle. A couple of vultures
are trying to ride thermals, but instead of a lazy circle
they have been drifting backwards,
and need to flap their huge wings to stay aloft. It would
be hard to be a bird of any kind
today, and indeed there have been more of them on the
ground than in the air. Robins
and blackbirds of all kinds are predominant, but a pair
of white-throated sparrows
has started to gather nesting materials in the vicinity
of the grape trellis. We
are headed down to the leek patch to see if we can gather
enough for
a salad later, and check the progress of fiddlehead ferns.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Saturday, April 10, 2010, 11:30 a.m.
45 degrees, windy, mostly sunny
It is a gorgeous day, but chilly. We had a dusting
of snow on the ground first thing
in the morning, but it has all melted. Our beautiful
daffodils are dancing on the wind,
hardier than they look, and several bunches brighten up
rooms indoors as well. The
forsythia is a riot of shimmering yellow blossoms, and it
looks like tulips only need a
little encouragement before they too add color to the
yard. Yesterday was very cold
and windy, but the local birds didn’t even seem to
notice. We had more than the usual
number of redwing blackbirds in just about every maple
tree within our view, and huge
flocks of robins were relentless in their pursuit of not
only the early worm, but the mid-
day and twilight worms as well. Bluebirds and tree
swallows are beginning to make
bargains over living arrangements, and it looks like we
will have most of our nest-
ing boxes in use this spring. I believe we will see a
return to more typical
spring weather as the week progresses, with lovely sunny
days and cool
nights filled with frogsong and the call of owls from the
deep woods.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Friday, April 9, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
36 degrees, breezy, mostly cloudy
Now, that’s what I call a real change
of weather! Yesterday’s high temperature
was forty degrees warmer than this morning’s low,
and we were sweltering in Utica
dressed in our long-sleeved shirts and warm trousers. We
had been led to believe that
yesterday would be cloudy and cool and mostly rainy, so
we headed to the city to pick up
some supplies, and halfway there the sun came out and we
actually switched on the air condi-
tioning. We would never have knowingly squandered such a
gem of a day in traffic and crowds
of shoppers, but at least after we got home we had the
chance to take a short walk and pick some
flowers before the cold front swept through. Around 6:30
a few big splats of rain showed up, along
with some distant thunder booms. Soon we saw giant
lightning strikes following the Black River Valley,
and some came fairly close to us. We enjoyed cocktails on
the sunporch and watched the storm circle
around Turin, better than anything on television,
that’s for sure. The temperature fell nearly twenty
de-
grees with the passage of that storm. Hard rain showed up
in the middle of the night, but it didn’t last
very long. We had a few snow flurries earlier today, but
they did nothing to keep a vast flock of star-
lings, grackles, and redwings from swooping into the
meadow, chattering, whistling, and singing their
hearts out. They have been hanging out for a couple of
hours, occasionally lifting off in great clouds
of bird-bodies, swooping and turning on a dime as one
giant living mass, and then landing to nibble
some more tasty wriggling tidbits. The sky is brightening
considerably, and I believe we will see
some sunny patches of blue before too long. Snow is in
the forecast for tonight and tomorrow,
but no real accumulation is expected, although that
wouldn’t surprise me one bit.
Have a wonderful day,
Daisy
Thursday, April 8, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
53 degrees, breezy, fog
Very dense fog has made it hard to tell whether it
is day or night out there.
Since the birds are going about their morning business of
singing heartily and
pulling worms and grubs from the soft ground, I am
certain that the clocks are
right and it is daytime. In fact, visibility on a clear
moonlit night is better than what
we have this morning. I could hear a big truck coming up
the road but couldn’t tell
what it was until it was right in front of the house. I
love the way birds appear from
out of the mist, little surprises on the wing, big and
small, crows and sparrows, com-
ing and going like a magic trick. Yesterday we walked up
the Gomer Hill Road to
watch a fence being installed at the Welsh Hill cemetery.
Last autumn the old fence
had been removed and some preliminary site work was
completed, the ground graded
and leveled. The wrought iron fence has been thoroughly
restored, and most of the top
half is the original ironwork. The bottom had been so
bent and pitted with rust that it
needed to be replaced. The restoration is a work of
perfection, and it has been set
into concrete and reinforced with steel rods beneath
ground level. The Welsh Hill
cemetery is very old; some of the epitaphs are written in
Welsh. I can find no
online history of this old burial ground, but it is worth
a look-see the next
time you are traveling in this neck of the woods, if for
no other
reason than to view the beautiful refurbished fence.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Wednesday, April 7, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
65 degrees, windy, mostly sunny
The wind blows heartily from the west;
occasionally a gust comes along
that whisks my breath away. So much for my plan to hang
out laundry today.
I would be picking it up from Main Street were I foolish
enough to try. At least
the flies were missing from the morning porch-sitting
experience, no doubt unable to
hold their own in the gale. Our forsythia hedge has begun
to bloom, and the branches
are covered with buds all the way to the top, proof of an
exceptionally mild winter. Pussy
willows by the neighbor’s ditch are at the frothy
green stage, just before they trade in their
catkins for small green leaves. Some sprigs that I have
in a vase with daffodils have sprouted
mouse-ear leaves and little rootlets; perhaps I will
plant them down by the spring. Streaky clouds
are beginning to arrive from the west, and I believe
there is a change of weather on the way for later.
We had some decent rain yesterday, about a quarter of an
inch, and the lawns and meadows have
responded by greening up nicely. This will be a good day
to uproot dandelions from the strawberry
and asparagus patches. I should be able to use the crowns
in tonight’s supper salad, a crisp and
slightly bitter treat that grows unpalatable by the time
the flowering stems start to form. This
will be our first fresh vegetable of this season, along
with some wild leeks that are not really
ready but I’ll dig a few anyway, just for seasoning.
I just love this time of year !
Have a beautiful day,
Daisy
Tuesday, April 6, 2010, 8:15 a.m.
50 degrees, breezy, overcast
Rain seems imminent, I can almost taste in on the breeze.
Yesterday we had a few sprinkles in the morning, and then
by afternoon the sky was blue with big fluffy clouds. I
had time
for a short walk after arriving home from work in the
early evening,
and heard a wonderful frog chorus calling from the vernal
ponds in near-
by woodlands. I walked by two big frogs that had been
squashed in the road,
but so far the musicians have been mostly smaller species,
like tiny spring peepers.
I haven’t seen any toads in the garden yet, nor
heard their cricket-like trilling; perhaps
they are slow to wake up from their long winter nap.
Toads are true hibernators; for
more information, check this link.
Just now rain has begun to fall, with the western
facing windows showing big individual drops that leave a
little trail as gravity pulls
them down towards the sill. I guess I will weed the
asparagus another day.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Monday, April 5, 2010, 8:15 a.m.
57 degrees, windy, partly sunny
A small chance of afternoon showers does little to
dampen our prospects for
another lovely spring day. I heard some frogs calling
last night as I walked outside
before bed, which shouldn’t have surprised me; we
found the first coltsfoot flowers
blooming yesterday as well. Frogs and coltsfoot go
together like peanut butter and jelly.
As soon as spring is truly here on Tug Hill, brilliant
yellow rays of sunshine poke up through
the roadside dirt in clusters that light up the way like
Dorothy’s yellow brick road. The frog
chorus wasn’t massive, just a few tentative peeps
and squeaks, and if we get some rain later
they will surely sing this evening. We walked down to the
creek that gives Mill Creek Road
its name, and most of the snow is gone from that seasonal
venue. The creek isn’t very deep,
and although we looked for native brook trout hanging out
by rocks and logs, we didn’t
see any. Trout season started last week, but I do not yet
have my fishing license. After
we returned home, we picked up two front-end loads of
road-sand from the yard,
and there is at least one more load to go but we called
it a day before muscle
fatigue set in. Now that all of the spring clean-up is
complete, we can enjoy
a brief lull before the lawns need mown and gardens
require daily attention.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Sunday, April 4, 2010, 9:30 a.m.
55 degrees, windy, mostly sunny
Today’s weather is much more representative
of April than the past couple of days’.
it was downright hot yesterday, eighty degrees and
somewhat sultry. If there hadn’t
been a good breeze it would have been oppressive. That
friendly breeze morphed into
a chilly roaring wind by the time I retired, and I had to
close the window to just a crack,
or the covers would have been whooshed right off the bed.
The morning air is fresh and
cool and practically vibrating with colors, from the blue
of the sky to the greening of the
meadows, and of course crocuses have spread all over and
dot the lawns with purple,
yellow, and white. We planted three kinds of lettuce,
swiss chard, spinach, onions,
and a short row of beans, taking a chance that spring is
here to stay. Everything but
the beans will withstand cold temperatures, and if global
warming will cooperate then
we just might have a few early green beans. We walked
around the meadows and noted
that wild leeks have grown nearly an inch a day since
they first poked through, and fiddle-
heads have bumped up the soil where they will emerge in a
few weeks. We could use some
rain, and while there are showers in the forecast for the
coming week, we need a good two
or three day soak to make up for the dearth of snow last
winter. The phrase is,
after all, April showers bring may flowers. (That’s
showers,
not floods, in case Mother Nature is reading this...)
Have a fabulous day,
Daisy
Saturday, April 3, 2010, 7:30 a.m.
35 degrees, breezy, mostly sunny
We must have broken the weather record for
yesterday’s date with a high temperature
of 79 degrees here on Gomer Hill. Such a nice balmy
breeze finally melted all of the rest
of the snow in the flower beds so we could finish raking
the lawn and gardens. There is still
some sand to haul away from the ditch by the road, but we
will let that dry out a bit more
before we shovel it up. There are many stretches of
beautiful emerald green grass in the
meadows, and it won’t be long before we need to rev
up the lawn mowers. The vegetable
gardens should be dry enough to rotary cultivate today; I
can’t wait to sow some spinach and
lettuce. Our fall-planted garlic already has a good start,
and is poking up about two inches from
its straw mulch. We walked a few miles on the Smith Road
yesterday, and didn’t see any sign of
coltsfoot, which is the first wildflower to bloom once
the spring sun warms the roadsides. There
are still a few random patches of corn snow here and
there, but I’ll bet most of them will dis-
appear today as the mercury climbs into the eighties.
Wild leeks are barely showing their
tips in the usual spots, but I think once they emerge
there is no stopping them. There
will be a cold front coming through tonight, but tomorrow
will be awesome,
cooler than today but sunny and redolent of springtime
goodness.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Friday, April 2, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
65 degrees, breezy, mostly sunny
Wow, it is really very warm outside and not even nine
o’clock yet!
The town crew has been busy for a couple of hours
sweeping the sand
from the tarmac, loads and loads of it, used over the
course of the winter to
provide much-needed traction for vehicles on the snowy
hill. We have raked up
several big piles from our lawn and left it in the
ditches, but I’ll bet it isn’t in their job
description to pick up those. We have raked as much of
the yard as we can; some shady
spots still have snow. Yesterday I fluffed up the
wildflower and rock gardens and perennial
beds, and straightened out the bird bath so now it
doesn’t have a deep end. Crocuses have
sprung to life; where there had been just a few desultory
spiky leaves on Wednesday there
are now big sunny patches of bright yellow blooms. All it
took was a little heat to encourage
them. A couple of pansy plants that managed to survive
the winter have put out a few blos-
soms as well, and all of the other bulbs have grown
taller almost as we watch. One lonely
daffodil that has been under our lilac bushes for at
least twenty-five years has a yellow
bud on it, but all the others are still at the emerging
leaf stage. The next few days
may contain record-breaking highs, and if the gardens dry
out enough to
cultivate, I will plant a few rows of cold-hardy veggies.
It’s a gamble,
but if it pays off in earlier salads then everybody wins!
Have a great day,
Daisy
Thursday, April 1, 2010, 8:30 a.m.
45 degrees, calm, sunny
Now here’s an unusual weather phenomenon !
Although the ambient temperature seems quite warm, we
have been under attack from a freak
snowstorm that has delivered an almost immeasurable
amount of wet heavy snow to the Tug Hill region.
I should have suspected something was amiss when I saw a
yard full of juncos last night (also known as
snowbirds); they were clearly harbingers of this surprise
blizzard. Although I shouldn’t be all that surprised,
as many unusual things are said to happen on the
first day of April. What is true is the part about the
juncos;
they are still here this morning, picking their way
across the lawn which is bejeweled with morning dew. An
ocean of fog fills the valley, and it reflects the sun so
brightly that it seems like it is generating its own glow,
like a huge light fixture set in the floor of a trance-dance
hall. We sat for a spell on the back porch this
morning, and were treated to the rich spring songs of a
variety of birds, including tom turkeys. The buzz
of flies has been added to the soundtrack, and they kept
landing on my bare feet; it seemed rude to brush
them off, so I endured their little tickle. A pair of
bluebirds has decided that the little house at the end of
the garden is perfect for them, and both have been in and
out of it several times. They haven’t started
to build a nest yet, but have placed a few strands of hay
inside to mark the property as sold. One
of the houses across the road has been marked as well,
and it won’t be long before all
manner of birds are hatching out the next generation of
feathered friends.
What a beautiful morning !
Don’t get fooled today,
Daisy
~
|
