Spring is happening

On Tuesday I measured the snow in one of the shadier spots of the yard, away from drifts or shoveling, and there were still 22" of snow there! But its's been right around 50 degrees every day this week so it's melting quickly now. Flowers started coming up last week in the 1" gap between the snow pile from shoveling off the roof and the front of the house. So on Monday I got in there and cleared off the snow from the rest of that flower bed as gently as possible and not we have dozens of flowers sprouting (most were already growing under the snow!) and a number of crocuses beginning to bloom. The next step is to carefully clear away the leaves I put down last fall over the flower beds as insulation, since now they are just insulating the soil from the warmth of the sun and blocking more flowers from sprouting. While I'm at it I will have to do the same for the leaves covering some new raspberry bushes that I transplanted from Bryn and Louis' yard last fall.

Some rhubarb was coming up along the south side of the house, but a moose ate it. Usually they avoid rhubarb because the leaves aren't very nutritious and are hard to digest, but with the deep snows and as cold as it was in January they have had a rough winter. With as warm and sunny as things have been I have a feeling that the snow will be replaced by new growth especially quickly this year, though, so soon the moose will be feasting again. And I'm not worried about the rhubarb - that stuff is the bamboo of the north.


Beth and I started some seeds indoors last week, which might have been a bit too early as they will probably outgrow their containers before they can be replanted outdoors. But yesterday I actually planted some spinach and kale outside (big difference between the 22" in the shade and the sunny part of our yard, which has been bare for almost 2 weeks) along our tool shed. It still gets pretty cold overnight, so I laid down some clear plastic sheeting right on top of the dirt to essentially make a 2-D greenhouse. We're probably going to rebuild that shed when Beth's folks are in town over Memorial Day and we'll have to take out the garden then, but I figured there's no harm in planting greens, which can be harvested and eaten anytime. The raised beds near our back door are nearly snow-free now, too. So last night I cut up a whole bagful of seed potatoes and covered them with wet paper towels to get them to start sprouting. After they get a bit of a headstart I'll plant them deep enough that by the time they come up they should be past the danger of frost.

The deep snow insulated the ground this winter, so the soil didn't freeze nearly as deeply as last winter in spite of the cold. This has let meltwater drain and prevented a repeat of last year's "Loch La-Poo." Man am I glad about that because with all the snow Beth and I weren't able to doo much mid-winter cleanup before Bella's business got buried. We're trying to keep up with the situation by spending Wednesday evenings "poop mediating" (since Thursday is trash day) and hopefully once the snow is gone the lawn won't be in too bad of shape.

Speaking of poop (even if you would rather we were not) I have recently been alerted to the fact that my poop-based estimates of the moose population is probably overstating their numbers. The moose that ate the rhubarb also made its way into the backyard and ate most of a pile of branches that I needed to clean up this weekend (thanks) as well as the stubs of last year's veggies from one of our raised beds and a few branches off of one of our cherry trees (boooooooo!). It also left piles of turds everywhere, which I had to clean up before Bella did. Based on that I would not have guessed that just one moose spent only 8 hours in our yard...

Yesterday Beth and I sat outside and drank a couple glasses of wine while soaking in the sun and I was actually quite comfortable in a t-shirt. The grill has been busy again recently and on Wednesday our Christmas tree, planted in the snow in our backyard ever since mid-January, finally toppled. All together, these are definite signs of spring - way more important that the 22" of snow along our fence...