The Water Music of Spring

The spring peepers are back! They were only a couple of weeks late emerging from hibernation after the long and horrible winter. Sometimes called peep toads, these little frogs are only about an inch long. The spring peepers actually do say “peep-peep” or sometimes even “peeper-peeper” in such a cheerful way. They’re just looking for a date with a mate, but what a musical way to go about it. You can hear these tiny nocturnal critters in wetlands at night in April and May. Once the weather warms up, boy, can you hear them from dusk to dawn in one loud happy chorus.

The daylight music sessions belong to Rana sylvatica, or wood frogs. Their chirp is described as “raspy quacks” and they do sound like ducks sometimes. Other times they almost sound like they’re laughing ha ha ha, clustered round a vernal pool, sharing some amphibian humor. “How cold was it this winter? Well, it was so cold I almost croaked.”

All the little frogs of spring give up their daily concerts as summer approaches and their home-life settles down. I miss hearing them when they grow quiet, but the next sound on the program is the deep baritone of the bullfrogs. While it’s hard to mimic their sound, it really doesn’t sound much like ribbit.

There are many types of bird song in spring’s symphony; I only wish I could identify them all. The woodpeckers provide the percussion section with their steady rat-tat-tat. Soon the little hummingbirds will complete their long journey north. I’m glad to see them but don’t you wonder why they don’t just stay in a nice warm climate all year long?
The flowers and blooming trees and shrubs have been a little more reluctant to emerge this spring. I brought in some forsythia branches to put in water while the snow was still on the ground. Forced to bloom early indoors, the bright yellow forsythia made a nice Easter decoration. The lily plant’s white flowers trumpeted the arrival of spring, even if the outdoors was still in winter’s grasp. Now it looks like we’ll get all of our spring flowers blooming at once.

May is my favorite month, with its lilacs, lily of the valley, and tulips. Soon the rhododendrons and flowering trees will bloom too. I only wish the leaves would appear on the trees out here earlier in the year. They are bare for an awfully long part of the year. I’m longing to see green again. I’m looking forward to summer’s fast-growing weeds like jewelweed and pokeweed growing even taller by the roadside than those blasted snowbanks were this winter.

One April afternoon I saw a snapping turtle in the front yard. I stayed out of its way and it found its way to the water with no trouble, having already crossed the road without incident. Last year I saw a huge dying snapper with its shell crushed lying on the road, obviously run over not long before I came upon it. Since it was daylight and the turtle was certainly easy to see, you have to wonder if some jerk (for want of a stronger word) deliberately ran over it. Such acts of cruelty are always terribly upsetting to nature lovers.
More annoying than disturbing is the fresh crop of nasty roadside litter that has emerged from winter’s deep snow. No point ranting about idiots that litter; to use my least favorite phrase, it is what it is. It’s up to the rest of us to tidy up after them. Thanks to everyone who has been picking up litter this spring. It’s an easy way to help make our town more attractive. Roadside litter gives the unfortunate message that the people who live in this area don’t care how their community looks.

Earth Day celebrates its 45th anniversary this spring, though those of us of a certain age might have trouble processing the fact that 1970 was 45 years ago. Wasn’t 1970 about 25 years ago? No, that was 1990 and that was the year the Hubble Telescope was launched. It’s worth looking up the truly amazing Hubble photos to be astonished all over again by this remarkable achievement. Look under the photo gallery on www.hubblesite.org.

The Hubble has revealed a universe than is more strange and wonderful than anything imagined in science fiction. Considering the infinity of the cosmos as seen in these photographs makes us realize that while we are just a mere speck in the universe, Earth is indeed a very special planet that we must take care of. Since it is our only home, every day should be Earth Day.