After more than a week of nearly continuous snow left a foot on the ground, it was cheering to learn Puxatawney Phil promised an early spring on Groundhog Day. What could be nicer?
Of course it immediately began to snow once again after Phil
returned to his nest, while temperatures lurked below the freezing level. But
two days after his appearance Phil seemed prophetic. We experienced an entire
night without an additional layer of the white stuff.
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| Did Phil Get It Right? |
Tuesday dawned not exactly bright, but at least clear.
Things were looking up. Then beautiful wife Sandy spotted a sure sign of
spring. She saw the first robin of the year enjoying the heated bird bath
outside the door to our side deck. Feb. 5 was far and away the earliest date a
red-breast has appeared since we moved here five years ago.
Unfortunately, a scant hour later I told Sandy I’d seen a raven perched atop our
mailbox. “That’s a bad omen, isn’t it?” I asked.
“That’s a lot of nonsense,” our resident birder replied.
“What you saw was a big fat crow. There aren’t any ravens around here.”
Just then snowflakes began to fall. Briefly, the temperature
rose above freezing. Then it took a nosedive, converting the melted snow to a
sheet of shiny new ice on our driveway. Another light dusting of snow topped
off what would have been a very nice skating rink had we dialed up some
appropriate waltz music.
Well? Could that have been a misplaced raven flapping its
wings atop our mailbox?
6 comments:
Sign of spring? Forecast in our area reduced from "Blizzard" to "Winter Storm Watch" -- with up to a foot of snow.
Phil is usually right, but remember he does not live in MI. As winter officially ends on March 21 at the Equinox or thereabouts, he can't be far wrong for those of us in more southern climes. Dianne
"heated bird bath" ! ... What sort of 'wussy' birds do you have over there ? :-)
The wussies are pampered pets of the resident bird lady. Actually, the choices are heat, provide skating surfaces, or let them be dirty birds.
Our local "Flatiron Freddie," a stuffed marmot who began his forecasting career as road kill, predicted 6 more weeks of winter. He has an 80% success rate, and I hope he's correct this year, because we desperately need the moisture.
You have crows? I haven't seen crows in Illinois since West Nile killed them off. I don't even see Blue Jays anymore. I'm wishing some warm weather for you soon. My daughter told me they had a sheet of ice under the snow too.
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