May 30

Last night the temperature didn’t go below 60, and we were witness to a storm of lightning and wind near midnight, leaving the dawn leaf strewn and sultry. May, it appears, is ending less like spring and more like summer, and it is strange to think it nearly snowed only a few days ago.

The first crickets were chirping last evening as if to welcome the transition to June. Their strident calls are still tentative trials of new legs and rasping fiddles that will become more proficient over the next several weeks. I imagine that the grasshoppers have molted twice since they emerged; we saw a couple near the front garden several weeks ago that were tiny versions of the adult, surely the first instar that will grow slowly to become the big jumpers and flyers of our midsummer.

Fred was transplanting leeks across the road, placing seedlings one-by-one into punched holes in the row of white plastic. The white is stark against the predominant browns and greens, but it is a precautionary concession to the coming heat of the next several days; little leeks may burn in hot soil below the traditional black.

I walked the fallow row toward home after checking the transplanting progress and to see how the parent killdeer were faring. Despite being told by Fred the approximate location of the nest (near the end of the adjacent row of scallions), I almost stumbled right upon the small pile of rocks, pea sized, that were just in the open.

No chicks as of yet, but both parents made a fuss at my approach, placing their wings outward in a bow, calling and stumbling along the ground as if to encourage me away. I caught a glimpse of only a single egg, camouflaged like a rock, amidst the nest.

Notes:

Milkweed flower buds appearing.