Another Snow

Another Snow

March 25, 2014

Morning

I awoke to the ground almost covered by snow, and more snow falling steadily.  Large, thick flakes were quickly covering the still leafless limbs and branches.

Though most people in southwest Indiana were likely grumbling today, I was rejoicing.  I could easily live in northern Maine.

The snow was so beautiful, the air bracing.  I thought of the snow piling up on the garden beds I had planted the day before, while the ground was dry, knowing that when the snow melts, it would sink into the ground, swell the seeds and coax them into germination.

I put on my hooded sweatshirt, winter vest, boots and gloves and headed outside to be fully surrounded by falling snow.  The wind was picking up, driving the snow toward the southeast, and some into my vest collar.

I went to the edge of the woods to look down and watch Cottonwood Pond.  The creek was a brown ribbon draped lazily across a white background.  The snow was piling up steadily on branches.

The water of the pond was a deeper brown, the yellowish cast of the previous days now gone.  I saw no ice formation from that distance.  The trunk of the fallen Cottonwood, stretching uphill, looked as if someone had painted its whole length with a thick coat of white milk paint.

The lower half of the root ball, over the pond, was brown, as the root ball was tipped a little over the pond, creating a dark, shadowy shelter.  I saw a bright spot of red in the darkness.  A male Cardinal was sitting among the rootlets, taking refuge for awhile from the wind and driving snow.

As I waited, more birds visited the area, singing, calling, flying around – spring activity was not stopped by an early spring snowfall.  I noticed that they were attracted to the brushy places, such as the tangles of branches in the tops of fallen trees.  This included the Bent Blue Beech across the south side of Cottonwood Pond.  They liked the landing surface of the horizontal trunk, but also the sense of shelter in the brown leaves that cling to the branches all winter.  Some birds flitted over the root ball now and then, and rested on the rootlets.  Though I could see the Cardinals from where I stood, other birds melted into the darkness of that area, then reappeared when their wings caught the glaring winter morning light.

Two male Cardinals flew erratically toward me, arguing over territory.  A female Junco quietly landed on a limb at the edge of the woods next to me, and I watched her for awhile as she tilted her head to eye me and changed position with tiny movements.

A deep splash sounded from the bottom of the woods.  This is not a sound common to this section of woods, where the creek is young and shallow.  It had to be at the pond.  I knew there were no fish, and it was too cold for frogs.  I heard another splash and saw the ripples on the pond. It was clods of dirt falling from the rootlets, adding to the mud at the bottom of the pond.

A pale dry leaf floated through the air from the northwest and landed gingerly on the pond's surface.  The wind pushed it, like a toy sailboat, to the south end.

The wind picked up more, gusting, enough to blow some snow off of clusters of pine needles, then enough to blow snow off of tree branches.

It was still snowing steadily.  I thought of the tiny white blooms of Harbinger-of-Spring between the leaf layer and the snow.  I thought of the buds of Spring Beauty and Cut-Leaved Toothwort just forming, and the knobs of Prairie Trillium, Jack-in-the-Pulpit and Mayapple plants poking up underneath it all, ready to pop up and unfurl when conditions allow.  There was still plenty of time.  Fragile Fern would be up then, too, and it will become difficult to walk down to Cottonwood Pond without stepping on new spring plants.

But, for the time being it was all white, and everything was nestled.  There will be more snow melt to flow down the opposite slopes toward the New Inlet of Cottonwood Pond, to seep into the ground and nourish new growth, and to add freshness to the flowing creek.  But, this day, I enjoyed being able to see birds more clearly against the white background, and I enjoyed the silence of snow.

I headed back to the house.  As I removed my boots on the porch, I heard a Towhee singing from a treetop at woods' edge.