We Finally Saw The Sun

This is what one of my favorite trails looked like last Friday after 3-4 inches of snow.

 

Then on Saturday the sun came out and the temperature shot up into the 50s. I’ve never seen snow melt so fast.

 

The river is still handling the snow melt well, and has hardly risen at all.

 

Canada geese were enjoying the sunshine and doing what geese do.

 

I spent some time dawdling along the river banks, also enjoying the sunshine. I saw this thorny black locust tree there (Robinia pseudoacacia.)

 

I liked the way the sun turned all the shadows blue early in the morning.

Shadows weren’t the only thing on the snow-this is a small winter stonefly, in the family Capniidae, according to bug guide.net. The nymphs live beneath rocks and gravel on the bottom of streams and rivers. When the adults emerge they can be found along the banks-even on snow.  The adults feed on blue-green algae and the nymphs on aquatic plants.

Later in the afternoon I took about 20 pictures of this mushroom but didn’t like any of them because of the strong sunlight in the landscape beyond. Finally I cropped the background out of one and found something I could live with. I like the way the sun lit it up-which is what made me want to take the pictures in the first place.

 

This Japanese barberry (Berberis thunbergii) still had berries that the birds hadn’t eaten. That’s two fewer plants of this very invasive species to worry about.

 

Another invasive is the twining vine Oriental bittersweet (Celastrus orbiculatus) which also loves to grow along the river. Here it is doing what it does best-strangling a native tree.  This vine was originally imported from Asia for erosion control.  Birds loved its orange berries and now it is everywhere.

I left the river and went to a local park, where I found this witch hazel blooming. Our native witch hazel (Hamamelis virginiana) blooms in the fall but many ornamentals are vernal witch hazels (Hamamelis vernalis,) meaning they bloom in the spring.

The daffodils at the park look just like they did weeks ago. They too have been waiting for warmth and sunshine.

 

Sometimes if everything comes together just right the setting sun turns the water in the local marsh to gold. I like being there when it happens.

If you think Sunshine brings you happiness, then you haven’t danced in the rain. ~Unknown

Thanks for stopping in.