Time to get your feeders out and ready. The hummingbirds are returning! I can’t wait!

This week promises lots of warm temperatures, sure to pop out the leaves, hatch bugs, and by the looks of the mosses around me, stir up the pollen. Winter stretched on so long that spring is having to rush into summer. I’m caught off guard. There are snow piles melting in the shade and the hummers are coming. My boots are still standing at the door.

In case you’ve forgotten, the recipe is 1 part sugar to 4 parts water. I make mine in a pint glass measuring cup by measuring 1/2 c of sugar, then filling the cup to the 16 oz line. Not accurate but easy and close enough.

Emergence

Signs of spring..

The driveway is a combination of snow, ice and mud. The roads are worse, all mud, thick, deep and greasy. You don’t need a picture.let your imagination go wild.

The skies alternate between a glorious clear blue and lead.

The snow pack in the woods is finally condensed enough, packed if you please, for me to stay mostly on top with my snow shoes, widening my horizons considerably. (The freeze, thaw, snow some more cycle had made it difficult to walk without crashing through. With these depths, it was dangerous for me to strike out alone and my walks had become confined to previously packed trails.) I also switched to longer, 25″ snow shoes for these ventures, just as a precaution.

The woods around me are a cat’s cradle of colorful pipeline. Sugaring has begun. Late this year, and I’m told that is a bad sign for the business.

I have mixed feelings about pipelines. The structure is somewhat beautiful against a snowy background. But when sugaring’so over, I want them gone. I hate to see them in any other season and don’t like to have to negotiate around or under them in the summer woods.

More snow as I write, but I t won’t last. Tonight there will be rain, tomorrow warmer temperatures. The last week there have been bugs flying around outdoors. After today, I’d better think about mud boots and hang up my snow shoes for another year.