Spring

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A Kurdish girl celebrating Newroz - "a new day" - the arrival of Spring.
-Photo by Umit Bektas

Yesterday the Vernal Equinox - with Spring arriving at 8:07 pm.

Our time is all discombobulated with Daylight Savings Time - plus here in Indiana where I am - we are a time zone ahead. By the sun - if we were on Central Standard - that would make the most sense. As it is - the sun is high in the sky closer to 2:00 pm. It rises close to 8 am and sets close to 8 pm. So essentially - we are 2 hours off the sun.

To "celebrate" yesterday - I ordered 340 trees and shrubs from the DNR. Of course they are little trees 1-3 year olds - but thre is quite a variety with the Wildlife Packet and the Outdoor Lab Packet. I am looking forward to planting them. This is the third place we have lived where we have planted trees like this.

I have also ordered over a pound of wildflower seeds - a butterfly/hummingbird mix as well as purple coneflower and various other things (a pound is enough for 2500 sq. feet). The basic thing with the wildflowers is to kill the grass if there is grass - till the soil - perhaps add some other stuff, spread the seeds, walk on them and water occasionally when there isn't rain. This is the time of year to plant them for Southern Indiana - now through April.

So far I have some little iris blooming, some of the daffodils are almost blooming, one of the crocuses is blooming. (Update - that was early in the day - by late afternoon there were 9 crocuses blooming and lots of daffodils in bloom - spurned on by the warm 76 degree day). (2nd update - the crocuses only lasted a day - apparently it was too warm for them to keep blooming and they shriveled up - the daffodils are doing well, though). Some of the lillies I planted last year are coming up - it looks like something - deer? - has been eating the shoots. Hopefully there will be enough other stuff to eat and they will leave them alone now.

In the woods - McCormick's Creek - a week ago - there were white trilliums blooming. I want to get there once a week and watch the progress of the wildflowers in the woods. Today - the purple trillium were sending up leaves. A few "Spring Beauty" were in bloom.