After leaving my eye doctor’s office in Bucksport, I decided to go home to Waldo via the back roads. While driving along an open area in the Town of Prospect, a welcome sight met my eyes…a long swath of brilliant yellow coltsfoot. These were so bright that they almost glowed.
A little later, further on down the same road, a pussy willow shrub caught my attention. The fuzzy, gray catkins had appeared, another sure sign of spring.
Then, while trout fishing on a little freestone stream, I saw something slide into the water as I approached a particularly “trouty” looking pool. It was a common garter snake. This amazed me, first to see a snake at all right now, especially in the bottom of a cold, snow-filled valley. And second, that the snake took to the icy-cold water in order to escape me. It would seem that a cold-blooded animal would immediately become paralyzed upon plunging in to near-freezing water.
I tried to help the little critter out of the stream by probing with the tip of my fishing rod, but it escaped me. Figuring that if it had enough energy to evade my well-intended efforts, it probably had sufficient steam left to crawl back out of the water after I left, which I did immediately.
These three events have one thing in common. They are all “firsts” for the new season. As such, they deserve to be noted down for posterity, either on a calendar or in a notebook or journal.
So spring has really arrived and from now on, things will only get better. Keep your eyes and ears open and prepare to witness nature at its best.
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