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I’m often very conscious – some would say overly conscious – of what I may be disturbing while carrying on working as the temperatures get cold.
As winter arrives, and more of our fellow creatures on this blue, brown, green and white globe have gone into a protective state that amounts to survival mode, that caution for me only heightens. And it’s not just our amphibian and reptile cohabitants whose success at making it through the winter I worry is at stake, but also our pollinator friends come to mind. After all, what are bees doing while we’re making snowmen?
When I was ten years old, I watched my father trasnform a modest yard, topped by a broken down car, into a lush garden.
I watched as passers-bys stopped, stared, and offered warm compliments.
I watched as this little breath of nature in the concrete jungle helped encourage neighborly behavior, something we much needed on that particular block.
Punxsutawney Phil might be the most famous rodent in the United States, or at least most famous gimmick a rodent has gotten to play over the last century plus. Groundhog Day, of course, celebrates that prospects of spring, and ceremonies - including that most famous one in Pennsylvania - pose the question that is on everyone’s mind in early February: Is Spring on just weeks away?
For those in ground hog country, how many times have you seen a wild groundhog appear at the start of spring, let alone in advance of it? In my years on the homestead, I for one cannot report one such case. Actually, they don’t tend to appear till the ground has warmed some, as their underground lairs change temperature by 1 degree or less per day, even as the weather changes dramatically above them, due to the fact that soil temperatures shift very slowly, particularly at greater depths. But there is a creature we can turn to, even if it means we must be a bit more patient. Enter the Cellophane Bee..