Bluebells by the Acre

Did you want to see bluebells growing in their native sort-of-swampy habitat, during the peak of blooming? Me too. Today I took happy advantage of the creek-side path I personally cut through the woods in fall and winter. The farther I walked, the more bluebells (Mertensia virginica) there were, to the left, right, ahead, behind. Golly!

I Am Not a Mosquito

Wet, warm weather, and for the first time this year hearing airborne buzzing around me I was unable to process it because: I forgot there are mosquitoes! I slapped at the air, so that anyone watching would have thought I was doing the Macarena. Winter was so long, I forgot that country air is not only full of pollen but rife with flying, biting insects.

As I fled I saw this huge mosquito on the side of the house and thought, wow, climate change is causing mutations, because they seem only to get bigger and bigger! And took a photo, and, safe on my screened porch, I thought, I've never seen a mosquito with such pretty wings. And looked it up. It's not a mosquito. It's a crane fly, of the family Tipulidae. It is a sign of spring and bites nobody. It eats nectar, not blood. They live 10 to 15 days.

Please Re-Lease Me

October 1 came and went and no new lease arrived in the mail, and the landlord's office said somebody else had to decide, and meanwhile I feared that the delay meant eviction.

Months went by. I kept paying rent thinking, where would I go?  I guess I could be happy anywhere, I said, knowing that each day I woke up in a tiny (affordable) apartment or trailer or shack, even with better carpeting than now, I'd be heartbroken: 100 acres, gone! Porch, lizards, woodpeckers and hummingbirds, crocuses and mushrooms, firebowl and two-car garage -- gone! I couldn't live -- I couldn't make it! (Oh, come on, I thought. This is not Syria. You could rent a two-bedroom in the part of the city that only looks like Syria.)

Crocuses appeared March 12 this year.

After five months I learned that the people who'd routinely mailed the lease had retired and the new employees were months behind on their work, and the lease was now ready to sign, all backdated to October.

But modified, so that every year the lease will renew automatically.

So relieved I nearly fainted. I will probably stay here the rest of my life, I thought, and began making plans.

Surprise

Whippoorwills and owls are now calling at night, and occasionally in daylight I inspect the bluebird box to make sure all is well (and that snakes and bats haven't invaded it). Removing the nest, I noticed with approval that it was lined with extra white fluff, unusual considering that bluebirds have no white feathers, and I was not expecting, at that moment, to see eggs in the nest, but I did. And was very surprised.

A bird that wasn't a bluebird, more like a chickadee, shot out from the box as I approached, and the rust-spotted ones must be her eggs; they match with other photos of chickadee eggs. Apparently the bluebird couple was evicted after producing one egg, and now their blue egg shares the nest with the other, smaller, spotted eggs. Never seen this before. Put it all back as it was. After the chickadees are hatched and raised I can clean out the box so the bluebirds will return and breed there.

A Rough Draft of Spring

March has been very gray, unusually gray, or was that my imagination? No, my neighbor Terri noticed it too, and we pined for spring sunshine, but day after day it's as dark at 9 in the morning as if it's 9 at night, and most of the time, raining. It's rained eight days out of the last ten. Even my dream last night included rain. I was out in the rain and found the dead body of a pileated woodpecker and began crying. Nice dream, huh? Thanks, March. It's raining now.

Yes, how many gray days occupied the month of March 2018? How many cloudy days have besieged us until we are all slightly crazy with traffic accidents all along I-44 every freaking day? Or let's put it another way; how many sunny ("clear") days have we had in March? I searched for the answer and found it here. Exactly ONE sunny day all month so far: Saturday, March 3. There's a sunny day predicted for Friday, March 30; that's the only other, if it happens. TWENTY-NINE days out of THIRTY-ONE this month were cloudy, mostly cloudy, partly cloudy, snowy, "T-storms," or scattered clouds.

But before I learned this awful truth I woke the morning of the equinox, March 20, before sunrise, saw a blush of color in the east and excitedly thought, "I will take a picture of the sunrise and call it 'Spring Sunrise'!" and prepared my camera. Sunrises develop their color -- it's like stirring Crystal Light into a glass of water -- so I waited and snapped, anticipating more color, and what you see here, that little pinkish blush, faded and vanished beneath more gray, and since that day it's rained like all get-out. Yes, this is your "nature photo" for the month. I can't even remember what I did all this March except trying to see Black Panther on a Tuesday only to be told at the box office that the afternoon showing was all sold out.

Yes, Yes, Yes!

Which day of the year tops them all? On March 21, spring equinox: Joy! April 24 the hummingbirds return, on the dot, and I run around screaming 'cuz I just won the lottery of life? All of June, the most beautiful month? July 4, when we create loud stars in the sky like we are God? July 25, the ripest day with the richest night sky? Thanksgiving Thursday, everybody's holiday? On December 21, winter solstice -- and the days begin lengthening, oh thank you, God! There's the day the spring peepers awake and sing (depends on precipitation, and they began on February 16). Or -- the first crocuses. They aren't wild; they were planted. By us, maybe 15 years ago. Earliest recorded appearance: Feb. 6. This year: Feb. 25.

Rain ended, yesterday I trekked over the property to watch brimming waterfalls, see ferns unfolding, look at buds on trees, step ankle-deep in mud, breathe in the most delicious, cleanest, laundered spring air and whitest sunlight, cleaned up trash by the creek, checked the cabin roof bashed (whomp! whomp!!) by thick oak branches broken off by Saturday night's windstorm -- the roof is okay -- and then bent to clean storm debris from the lane and around the cabin. That done, I was about to photograph the wonders of some velvety little buds when I looked down and saw in the sunny sweet spot at the house's southwest corner, these!

They never fail! If I were a flower, I would be a crocus (from the Latin word crocatus, meaning "saffron yellow"). Crocuses are not just the promise of spring. They are the signature on the contract!

Scarlet Elf Caps

Found behind the garage and marveled at: Red circlets tiny as drops of blood. They are Scarlet Cups or Scarlet Elf Caps (Sarcoscypha coccinea), mushrooms of early spring. Inedible. Found some more in the woods, tiny, beneath leafmeal. These must be the last of them, as they are often harbingers of spring. On the floral front, we are now seeing the last of the spring flowers, such as bluebells and phlox, and the first of the summer wildflowers, such as horsemint.

Moving Into His New House

When a tall person visited on March 9, I got his help taking down the old bluebird house, all weatherbeaten and cracked top to bottom, and mounting a brand-new one. Then, with an eye out for those house wrens who load up bluebird houses with sticks and thorns just to be ornery, I watched for a week, then two weeks, and was finally rewarded this morning as I sat in the spring sun drinking tea. Male bluebirds sit atop a bluebird house and flap their wings to attract their mates' attention. If she approves of the dwelling, she creates the nest and they go for it. Bluebirds are shy, so when this one saw me he fled the bluebird house and perched in a tree. I dream all year of this moment when the first bluebirds first nest in the bluebird house and I am the host and witness. This new bluebird box has a hinged side secured with a hook and eye--good design for box cleaning or nest viewing. It's raw pine. You can see it on the right, on the  old wooden post, which is 7 feet high. The downward-curved thing on the post is chicken wire to keep critters from crawling up the post to feast on bluebirds or their eggs. During previous birdhouse cleanings I've found lifeless blacksnakes and live bees in the box. I don't visit or handle the box very often, because that leaves a scent trail that might attract predators.

Be Good to Yourself

When peeper frogs sing (March 12), crocuses bloom (March 13), and I plant turnips and arugula (March 17) is my favorite time of year, and giddy with cheerfulness I chose as my mission to do something nice for myself, but then came the questions: Get a Subway sandwich? Go to the gym? Manicure hands so winter-dry that the knuckles bleed? And driving up "the strip" I saw an Auto Zone. Inspired, I stopped and bought what I truly needed for a happy spring: New windshield wipers. Hearing the clerk explain all the new exciting windshield wiper technology was by itself worth the price--but I also got the wipers and installation, after which we tried 'em out. My old wipers streaked the windshield like grease on a glass pan. The new wipers opened a whole world of clarity--sweet! Miraculous! What better way to celebrate spring than to see it clearly? $34 is cheap for such a long-lasting thrill.

Then I bought my sandwich, telling the sandwich artist that the sandwich was beautifully made and leaving a good tip, and went to the gym, and had a manicure and left a good tip, and have never been so happy about being good to myself. So you be good to yourself. The old-time pagans feasted at this time of year. Feast and celebrate any way you can.

Morel Hunting Tip #2: Proper Gear and Dress

Mushroom hunters, not just morel hunters, carry wicker or balsawood baskets for their finds. As they carry the woven basket through the woods, spores from the harvested mushrooms are free to leak through the gaps in the basket and settle in the earth in order to make more mushrooms. Clever, eh?

This hunter is dressed for the early morning during spring turkey season, in a hunter orange jacket. He is also tick-aware and uses duct tape (what else!?!?) to seal his pant legs all the way to his shoes. Along with his basket he carries a stick -- just one -- to poke at the forest floor, especially around dead or fallen trees.

Morel Hunting Tip #1: Find Your Own Ash

Morel mushrooms love to grow around fallen and dead ash trees, and an ash tree can be identified by the striking "X" pattern in its bark. This is a fallen ash tree, so you see a horizontal version of the pattern. No, there weren't any morels here--yet. Morels like the soil to be warmed to about 50 degrees before they "fruit," and it's been too chilly. So if you like morels, go locate your ash trees (especially on a south-facing slope), and poke with a stick in the leafmeal around their trunks and roots every day for the next week, provided the temperatures warm up a bit.

The Hummingbirds Are Here

Ever since the big snowstorm three days after the spring equinox, it's been so windy and stormy that the house (and the car!)  feels like a schooner in heavy North Atlantic seas. Today was drippy and dreary. But today the season's first hummingbird drank at my nectar feeder! Knowing that my favorite birds don't usually show up until the wonderfully green and floral dates around April 24 -- but pining for them like a lovesick teenager -- I put up the feeders April 1. Still -- today, a full week early, was the great day! It was a male Rubythroat. I will get his photo and show you his glorious colors ASAP. In the meantime, this is the glory that was ten days ago: my favorite flower, the crocus, during the thaw. The signs of spring come and go so quickly. . .

Day One

Yesterday played catch-up with all the mail and errands and bills after being away, and apologized to the birds miffed that I left them on their own without fresh seed and suet daily. They forgive easily; just give 'em free food. Today I prepared for my daily walk about noon. Not far from the door, beneath an oak, on a slope facing south, were the year's first crocuses abloom. This is always Day One of my personal year, the day with promise of a rich green future for us all here in rugged rural Missouri.

Cress in Spring Water

At the end of a rocky 3-1/2-mile hike today, with patches of snow still on the ground, I came to a dark little spring with stepping stones across it, and its whole downstream was paved with fresh watercress. Stunned to see such green wealth amid the blue and gray I got excited, and wanted instinctively to grab some for salad but didn't have a bag or nothin', and wasn't sure if it was legal -- so all I took was a photo. And I thought about the people before me subsisting during the winters on dried corn, dried meat, and dried beans and how thrilled they must have been to see and get the first fresh greens: always watercress -- leaves both bitter and sweet.

Hello, Southern Coal Skink

While I was cutting patches for the porch screens about noon, a rustling next to the pump house made me think, "It's the blacksnake." But the resident blacksnake is usually noiseless. More rustling. I went to look. Saw something unusual, cumin-colored, fat and glossy. I thought, "The glass lizard," but when I went outside with the camera and knelt by the ivy that covers fallen oak leaves, I saw its face and little alligator legs. What intelligent eyes. I said, "Hello."

When I moved too close it backed up beneath the ivy so that only its tail showed. I said, "I can still see you." The Amphibians and Reptiles of Missouri by Tom R. Johnson, the only handbook ever needed around here, ID'd it as Southern Coal Skink, plump body, stubby legs and all. Latin: Eumeces anthracinus pluvialis Cope. This is a female. The male has orange patches on its cheeks because it doesn't know how to blend foundation.

As The Sun Slowly Sinks into the Mud. . .

I aint complaining! It's the January thaw about three weeks late; 74 degrees today. Holy to hear the rush of water through the property's waterfalls Number 1, 2, and 3 (there are five). Yesterday in the woods, the snow parted to reveal patches of chives on a north-facing slope. To me they are the second real sign of spring. So today, slipping and sliding in inch-deep mud, I harvested some chives and scissored them into a bowl of carrot soup dolloped with yogurt and eaten with homemade rye bread.

Even better news: A bluebird pair has inspected and approved my bluebird box. I saw them this morning for the first time and my heart became a big bouquet of roses.

And at 5:30 p.m., as I turned away from photographing this mango-colored sunset, I saw in the east a big beautiful pearly full moon. What a wonderful world.

Something Blue

I favor blue flowers, and today I saw this, for the first time, over by the bluebird box, and looked it up. It's a Wild Hyacinth (Camassia scilloides -- there's a mouthful). "Common," says the handbook, Ozark Wildflowers, "in dolomite glades, open rocky slopes, open woodlands, and prairies, found throughout the Ozarks." That's a perfect description of the land I and my neighbors live on; it has all those faces. The handbook also said Indians ate this, but that it's better not to.

First Hummer of 2010

Approximate arrival date of my hummingbirds is usually 24 April. But I'm so eager to see them, so hopeful, I filled and hung the hummer feeders last week. I understand that if fed they will return to the same location every year -- that's why I call them mine. These little birds -- I don't know what it is they give me -- their elegant hovering and pivoting, their dainty honey-sucking, their small throaty communications -- maybe it's because I never saw one until I was way grown up, or because this is the first place I've lived that has attracted them.

Anyway, it's a ritual, and now I have a relationship with them, and every April I wait for them like a 13-year-old girl.

Stuck in the house yesterday because of pollen so thick it yellows the tablecloth and coats the inside of the car, I was talking on the phone about 10 a.m. when I saw a male rubythroat hummer at the feeder and went wild like a 13-year-old girl. MO Conservation calendar, which is sort of an almanac, designates the 25th as their arrival date, but here was one in the 19th. But I haven't seen him again, and he may have been passing through. But now I know mine must be on the way. Made fresh nectar for them: 4 parts water to one part white sugar. Combine and boil, then cool and serve.

Asparagus Keesh

("Keesh" spelling is courtesy of Demetrius, who spit the stuff out at a party where they served "pizza quiche." He was the same guy who microwaved some kiwifruit and stormed, "These are the worst potatoes I have ever eaten.")

Ahem. Friend and I, not all that old but experienced in life, were talking about pleasure, and when all is said and done, good eatin' is the one pleasure that never fails. In spring, whether one is young or not, one's fancy turns to thoughts of asparagus quiche, roasted asparagus, asparagus raw, sauteed, or steamed, asparagus pasta. I recommend using Baby Swiss cheese for a delectable result, and put the asparagus, once you steam it, on a layer of sliced spring onions if you can. Try as I might I couldn't get this photo right-side-up; must be the planets today.

Which Twin Has the Toni?

OK -- raking an acre of "lawn" -- if you can call clumps of weeds, cedar-tree sprouts, and mole holes a lawn -- is a big job -- especially because I didn't do it last year. Raking the the leaves (oak and hickory) into a pile, I then very cleverly sweep them onto an old shower curtain and drag the curtain to a place I can dump the leaves . . . smart. . . brains. . . no dumb bunny.