Spring Extremes

I love spring and its extremes.  The mornings are frosty and bright.  The afternoons are nearly sweltering.  The channel on Bird t.v. changes every five minutes.  Each time I turn around some new verdant thing has emerged from the ground, then grown to tower over me.

Heart-leaved Arnica

 When I walked the dog this frosty but sun-warmed morning, I identified 22 bird species.  My typical species count in winter usually gets stuck at 11.  There were a couple species that got away unidentified, but using binoculars with a 100 pound dog attached to the other end of the leash is...     fun. 

 I'll happily blame my poor bird I.D. skills on Scout. 

Scout "helping" me find birds

 Coming home, I successfully delayed lawn mowing by tending to the chickens then planting cool-weather seedlings in the raised beds. 

tiny spinach

 I took a late-morning break, by which time the temperature had risen to 12 degrees.  When I checked the feeders there were no less than 15 American Crows delightedly destroying my homemade suet.  (I will either have to buy a crow-excluding suet feeder or buy stocks in Skippy peanut butter.)  Two minutes later there was nary a crow in sight, having been replaced by myriad White-crowned Sparrows, a smattering of Dark-eyed Juncos, handfuls of Purple Finches, and our resident Mallard drake.  Next minute the place was swarmed by Yellow-rumped Warblers.

Yellow-rumped Warblers

 I went to the kitchen for a drink of water and came back to crows, Red-winged Blackbirds, and not a sparrow or warbler in sight.  Bird t.v. is great for my short attention span.

Back out in the garden,  my hands full of empty plant packs, Scout and I were suddenly transfixed by Swallow t.v.  A Tree Swallow swooped, dipped, and dived over us, disdaining our adherence to the laws of gravity.  Ten minutes later I snapped out of it, but only after the swallow moved on to make someone else envious of its flight.

By the time I drummed up the fortitude to start mowing after lunch it was 20 degrees.  

4 hours, 

3 ankle-snapping dog-dug holes, 

2 swallowed insects, 

and 1 knockout by the chicken tractor later, 

chicken tractor - undefeated champion by a knockout

 the lawn was mowed.  It didn't look much better than when I'd started but if you looked very closely you could see the grass was slightly shorter. 
 

lawn or something like it

 The shaded thermometer read 23 degrees when I was done.  Perhaps not as hot as much of North America in May, but quite a jump from the freezing morning.  

As I collapsed on the couch I dreamed of getting a goat to do the mowing .