March 11

It is warm enough today for me to sit outside on the porch, out of the wind and where my chair sits in the full sun. It is a glorious day, and it is reviving to feel the sunshine on my face and to listen to the birdsong.

I sit maybe 20 feet from our feeder, and after several minutes of my being here, the chick-a-dees show no hesitation at coming and going. The nuthatch is decidedly curious, remaining just beyond in the break line of the trees between the feeder and the access road. Less gregarious than the chick-a-dee, the nuthatch makes a slight humming call, not so much a social call, but rather a singular pip, I think inquiring of me and my purpose here.

The snow continues to melt off the roof in earnest, and the chorus of chirps and dripping sounds and the warmth of the sun against my skin make the storm of days ago seem in the past.

March 10

As I walked past the town fields this morning just after sunrise amid nearly perfect stillness, I heard the slow “whoosh whoosh” sound before I spotted it.

Coming in low and traveling east from the direction of Anna Maria, a long blue heron flew overhead heading toward somewhere unknown.

For just a moment, as I looked upward so that only sky and trees and the passing heron were in my vision, I could easily imagine some Jurassic scene, and the lone witness to this prehistoric bird silently, save for the “woosh” of its wings flying by.

The heron evokes this sense of ancient creature, with its habit of flight and occasional guttural squawk suggesting some pterodactyl in hunt.

I see the herons now and again in summer, usually wading near the sore of the pond, silently and patiently hunting for some small fish or errant crawfish. They are elegant in water, albeit somewhat unsettling, as they cautiously walk the shoreline, stepping with slow and deliberate intent, all the while looking with their penetrating gaze.

March 9

The storm of the past two days is now gone, and the skies shine clear, though the wind remains fierce.

Sitting in the sunroom watching the birds return to the feeders in earnest, the wind must be out of just the right direction, as the hurricane chime in the front keeps sounding.

It’s a fairly large triangular chime, that I fastened to the corner of the front barn. It’s weight is heavy enough so that only a fairly strong breeze out of the north will cause it to sound.

It is a deep and pleasing metallic chime, reminding me of the sound of the harbor channel markers that sit off Woods Hole in the Vineyard Sound. The intermittent “clang, clang” I am hearing just now is oddly out of place amidst the snowpack and winter scene. In my mind, I see seagulls hovering just above the boat, and warm water wind blowing spray from the tops of the crests, sounding the big red channel buoy as it pitches in the swells.

March 8

It snowed all night and several hours into today, with a driving wind out of the east that is typical of a nor’easter low that sits off the cape. I took a ruler out to the back, in a spot that isn’t subject to drifting too badly. Nineteen inches of new snow since yesterday afternoon and at least 6” more is forecast.

The drifts in our front dooryard are nearly four feet deep in spots, and the front entryway is completely blocked.

Just before bed last night, we checked the back porch to see if our surrogate new pet opossum had visited. She’s been regularly coming now for the past two weeks, foraging under the feeders for discarded sunflower seeds. Sure enough, she was sitting right on the porch, using her front paws and long snout to push aside the snow that accumulated around her, oblivious to our watching her from only a couple of feet away.

Where she goes during the day is only a guess, but we’ve seen tracks that seem to lead across the access road to the neighbor’s garden shed. And, when we first discovered her, the dogs gave chase while she ambled in that direction. (I kept hoping that she’d perform the coma-like seizure and drop dead, only to see what the dogs might do.) If she comes again tomorrow, JD wants to name her Pat.

March 7 part 2

The veracity of the groundhog is at stake today. Put another way, we’ve taken two steps backward in our seasonal progression.

In summer, I greatly admire Paxton’s situation at high altitude here among the Wachusett Mountain foothills. When the lower towns just 8 miles from here swelter in the July heat and humidity, we often are 5 to 10 degrees cooler, which makes such a difference.

In March, it can be a cruelty, as early spring (or late winter, depending on your point of view) storms back in from the ocean. Just 8 miles from here it is raining, while Paxton is blessed with 6” of snow – a heavy, wet snow that sticks to the evergreens and sags them over.

I am looking out the office window now, watching the snow pile up in the raised garden beds down at the lower end of the yard. This same scene was a Currier and Ives picture in December, but my patience has worn thin in want of sunshine and the verdant smell of Earth. March is fickle, and the weatherman has forecasted a stretch of 50s in a few days.

March 7

Given the recent uptick in bird activity, I thought it best to inspect the bird boxes we placed in the periphery around the feeder yard. All told, we have two wren houses and a large traditionally shaped bird house that has been home to chick-a-dees the past several years.

This has become a spring ritual, to open each of the boxes and clean out the nesting material of last year’s occupants. Admittedly, I always feel a bit ashamed at doing this, because I suspect (and hope) that the soon-to-be arriving tenets will be one and the same from last year. I feel guilty in so easily removing the engineering concoctions of twigs, moss and grass knowing that the same birds will likely spend hours rebuilding.

The two wren boxes had typical wren nests –overly packed and notably large for such a small little bird. The chick-a-dee house gave me a start just as I began backing out the screws that held on the wooden base. The screws made a screeching sound on account of friction with the wood, and this caused the entire box to resonate with a high pitch as I turned the screw.

After a few moments of this, I paused because the box itself was making a deep vibrating sound within, and for the life of me I couldn’t explain it. The vibration stopped. I started on the screw again, and no sooner did the vibration begin in earnest.

At this point, a child-like fear took hold of me, as I began to invent all sorts of irrational bird-box demons which were waiting to attack the moment the floor dislodged. Curiosity eventually overruled, though I admit to jumping back quickly as the last retaining screw released its grip and the floor dropped to the ground.

Wouldn’t you know, in the midst of all the nesting material of grass and twigs and bits of dryer fluff – a queen bumblebee had made her overwinter nest. She drunkenly buzzed about just within the nest ball, awakened rudely from her hibernation.

March 6

Drive along the roadways, or walk the back woods and you will notice the willows starting to yellow. If the light is just right, they even seem to create their own glow. The red and swamp maples are also starting to color in the stems.

Down on route 122 out of town, in the low area that forms a wetland which connects directly to the small lake inside Moore State Park, the road passes over a large culvert that provides passage for the wetland. On either side, but particularly on the eastern portion, swamp maples predominate around the low land.

They are starting to awaken so noticeably now, as if someone has painted on the stems a bare reddish sheen.