Leaves – Flowers – Birds – Trails

Yesterday is today is tomorrow. Spring enforces the sense of the ongoing makeover that occurs in life. Rain and warmer temperatures brought out leaves and an influx of birds. Wind fanned fires before the calm of cooler temperatures.

Quaking aspen leaves greened the landscape while tamaracks showed the first sign of needles. Here and there some ticks, black flies or mosquitoes suggested more were coming soon.

Indoors and out, the sounds of returning birds defined the claiming of mates and nesting territories. Finally, the balsam poplar leaf buds covered sidewalks, and their pale leaves began catching up.

Walking, running, bike riding, dog walks, and first paddling brings the invigoration of Spring. Graduations, next steps, summer jobs, vacation planning, fishing, and camping are on the calendar with plans for bright tomorrows.

Let’s get together with high school or college classmates, family, and friends who are all getting older.

Everyone has a discovery.

Stop at the gas station for a newspaper or some coffee.

At the checkout pictures of a nesting bird sitting on a nest are shared. What is it?

Any discovery is special for the first time. This time it is a robin. American robin to be specific.

Two days later two eggs are seen. Next visit she’s incubating four eggs. Then two hatches, two more, and all four begging for food. This will be the robin’s first nest of summer.

With a roof over the nest will these four young be safer than robin’s that nest on tree branches. Ravens have been nesting since March, and with hungry young nearly Ruby-throated ready to fledge will they be seeking vulnerable nestlings to feed them.

All the bird feeders have been put away for summer, and the hummingbird feeders are just put out. Next day a male ruby-throated hummingbird has already claimed this location as a food-rich territory. And now a female has joined him at the feeder.

The male’s courtship display flights are yet to come.

This morning the discussion on the walk to the lake focuses on the presence of flowers. Marsh marigolds fill the roadside ditches and flowers adorn the blueberry and service berry plants across the ledge rock.

Looks like the best may be yet to come.