Springtime in Roscommon

 

 

 

 

                           2025 Springtime in Roscommon

 

Since I have decided that our winter of 2024/2025 is now over, I thought I should advise you of the status of the oncoming spring via a blog. I had been considering issuing a new blog anyway and so my early morning decision about the end of winter seemed to be a marriage of practicality and timeliness.

It is probably no surprise that I always try to write something on a topic that I know about. It is either that, or I must write something sufficiently clever so that those of you who have nothing better to do than follow my blogs, continue to do so. I stared writing this morning. As shown in the picture above, I began too soon after making my way from the bed to the computer.

It is now several days later, and I have finally decided to continue writing by looking up a few of my earlier blogs on the topic of springtime in Roscommon. I found the following two poems in an earlier blog and they were written by authors too famous to ignore, so here they are.

 

Daffodowndilly, A.A. Milne*

She wore her yellow sun-bonnet,

She wore her greenest gown,

She turned to the south wind,

And curtsied up and down,

She turned to the sunlight,

And shook her yellow head,

And whispered to her neighbor

“Winter is dead”

(This poem is in the public domain)

 

Snowball, Shel Silverstein, Falling Up, 1996

I made myself a snowball

As perfect as could be

I thought I’d keep it as a pet

And let it sleep with me.

I made it some pajamas,

And a pillow for its head.

Then last night it ran away,

But first – it wet the bed.

 

 

2025 Springtime in Roscommon

Winter in Roscommon began in November 2024 after the first snowfall entertained our deer hunters who cheered the snow that made tracking their prey a bit easier. Things went downhill from there. Frankly, the 2024/2025 winter was a doozy with excessive snow, too much cold, and too little sun. Now, it is behind us as the calendar indicates. Yet the recent rain and lack of warm sunshine is making spring in Roscommon problematic as winter seems not to want to depart. After analyzing this circumstance for several weeks, I decided that bold action is needed to chase winter and welcome spring. What better way to accomplish this than a blog declaring that winter is now dead. Of course, some evidence for this cataclysmic change needs to be given and I decided that I am just the correspondent needed to convince doubters that spring has arrived in Roscommon.

The hints that spring has arrived are everywhere. One of the early indicators that winter has ended comes from my pond. Last fall, the pond responded to the first snow in November by forming a layer of ice at the shoreline and extending a dozen feet or more into the deeper water. The ice must have liked what it found because it decided to stay for the next four months. The ice is now a distant memory as it melted last month at the south end of the pond that was shaded by leafless trees. Those same trees are now showing buds and the tall swamp grass that ringed the pond at its north end are now dead, as they float into the deeper water pushed by the growing plants who seem to think their 2025 growth is more important than last year’s offspring that died after the first snow.

I have ventured to the river several times over the last month and noted the two new beaver lodges that adorn the shore. I don’t know if this portends the end of winter or not but at least is shows that beaver think so. The source of the material for the new lodges is readily seen: sometime during the last several weeks beaver have felled two of my Red Pine trees and dragged the branches to the river’s shore at the end of my property.

The daffodils in the front lawn are now responding to the warm sun just as A. A. Milne offered and a have several dozen of the daffodils showing their bright yellow color.

* Alan Alexander Milne (1882 –1956) was a British author, editor, poet, and playwright. Born in London, he is best known for his children’s books about Winnie-the-Pooh. He produced a vast amount of work in other entertainment genres. Interestingly, his degree was in mathematics. Milne served in both World Wars, despite his position as a pacifist. Though he suffered poor health in later years, he was at one time a gifted cricket player. I have several daffodils now showing their yellow blooms just as Milne described. Of course, I have no spring tulips to admire as a harbinger of the changing season. I planted several upon first moving to Roscommon, but they all disappeared. It took me several years to learn that tulips are a favorite treat for the local deer population, thus depriving me of another plant that shows its colors in spring.

Another important indicator of the seasonal change is the noise in the morning. We now have numerous woodpeckers who beat the logs, tree limbs, and a nearby road sign in hopes of attracting a mate. In addition to the woodpeckers, we now have many of our resident songbirds who think they should begin their singing as soon as the sun peaks over the horizon. While we are talking about birds, here is clincher that winter is dead in Roscommon and spring is now fully in command of our weather: today, May 8, 2025, a single hummingbird arrived at our feeder to the serenade of the Spring Peepers who finally began their regular calls to other new-borne frogs (in search of sex). Ain’t life grand.