A lamb in the countryside

As  expected, March came in as a lamb: daytime temperatures today were well over seventy degrees F.  I went down to the ponds early this morning, but in spite of the gentle rain we had last night things were quiet then; but when I went back later in the day the peepers were in full chorus.

More rain is predicted for the next few days, and we need it. Seed of larkspurs and corn poppies sown back in December are now germinating freely, especially the poppies. Seed of corn cockle sown last fall germinated almost immediately, and the resulting plants now have several true leaves. Those are corn cockle, Agrostemma githago, seedlings in the upper image. The lower image shows corn poppies, Papaver rhoeas: did every seed germinate? I'll have plenty of thinning to do later.

Peepers at KenGar: take a listen!

It's about 7 P.M. February 29, 2012. I've just come back from the local wetland site of the peeper ponds. It's raining and the temperature is about50 ⁰ F (about 10⁰ C): good conditions for the annual emergence of the peepers. I listened carefully and I think I heard two widely separated peeps. That's justification enough for me to make this posting. Tomorrow the temperature is predicted to be about ten degrees F higher, and sometime during the day the big choruses should start.

What are peepers? They're small (almond-sized) frogs.  For well over a century peepers were known as Hyla crucifer; in fact, the vernacular name hylas is still used. But in modern arrangements they are called Pseudacris crucifer. I attended an Episcopalian funeral recently and was intrigued to see that there is a participant in the ceremony called the crucifer. The word literally means cross bearer. The frog merits the name because of the big X on its back.

Here's a link to a recording I made last April at the same ponds. The sound of the peepers is accompanied by images of tommies, Crocus tommasinianus.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aH5pT3If_nA

Peepers

Yesterday evening I drove by the local peeper pond: peepers, chorus frogs and wood frogs were going in full chorus. This for me marks the real beginning of spring. The house is about a quarter of a mile from the ponds. The ponds are cradled by two raised earth masses, one natural and one man made; this in effect places them in a sort of amphitheater aimed at our house. I can go out onto the deck in back of the house and hear the choruses.
The peepers are the sopranino recorders in this trio; if you listen carefully through the din of the peepers, you can make out the viols of this trio in the barking/quacking grunts of the wood frogs.

March 2009

March 2009 was a big disappointment to me. That brief mild spell we had at the very beginning of the year raised great expectations; March dampened most of them. Not only was the month cold, it was also dry and windy. There was a bit of rain towards the end of the month, and last week we had several days of slow, gentle rain which gave the garden a good soaking - and brought on a surge of growth.

Spring peepers have been in chorus now and then since March 8. Last weekend Wayne and I stopped by the local "peeper central" to check out the action. The peepers were singing in their hundreds, maybe thousands. Through the din of the peepers we could also make out chorus frogs and wood frogs. Today I heard toads calling, too.

It puzzled me that there have been no toads at the waterlily pool in the garden. Today I found out why: as I approached the pool today I heard a loud splash, the sort of noise turtles sometimes make. I didn't see anything - then. I decided to sit and watch. Several minutes passed and then suddenly, so suddenly it startled me, a muddy brown cylinder nearly as thick as my forearm shot up to the surface of the water, grabbed a quick breath, and just as suddenly disappeared. It was a snapping turtle, evidently not a small one. That no doubt explains the disappearance of most of the fifty gold fish I put into the pool last summer. Yesterday I noticed some small gray feathers floating on the pool surface.

So March this year came in like a polar bear and went out like a snapping turtle.