Over the Precipice Into April

Flora & Fauna Return, April Floods, & the Reappearance of a Phantom Lake

Let’s start with a survey!

I should be tidying the basement and starting seeds there under the grow lights, but I thought it would be more fun to ask you all about your gardens.

Click here for a short survey (Only 2 questions, with multiple choice!)

Thanks for playing!

Green Returns

The last week of March was a whirl of snow, sleet, rain, and frost. But when that melted, there were green growing things popping up:

Late March, Green things return

(Clockwise from top left: Tulips, Daffodils, Lemon Balm, Chives)

The last days of March were chilly by the thermometer but the sunlight had warmth to it. Good days to spend looking at the ground, searching for signs of life coming up from the blanket of dead leaves. (We had to check the ground closely anyway, as it was time for the Great Spring dog poo clean-up, that celebrated herald of seasonal change in many a suburban yard.)

Our dog in a well-earned moment of leisure, after barking at squirrels.

Phillip had planted crocus, and they showed themselves, too:

Tiny blossoms popping up in the front yard.

And so Spring stealthily arrived here. The winter seemed to drag on; we huddled under piles of blankets at night and shook our fists at the heating bill, we made tea to ease the chills from both icy wind and viral fevers, we gloried in the blue sky and then sighed on waking to another snowfall. Then we happened to look down, and there were violet blossoms underfoot and beds of green leaves. Just a little longer, we thought, and the ground will hold warmth, and we’ll walk barefoot in the garden.

April Showers, April Floods

We had flood warnings locally last week, but luckily only the low-lying areas of our back yard were under water, and that for just a short time. Small potatoes compared to the flooding our area had in 2020, and absolutely nothing in comparison to all those losing their homes and livelihood to flooding out west.

Tulare Lake, in central California, is making another reappearance, and it’s a devastating and fascinating story. (You can read more about it here.) Prior to a century of building dams, levees, canals, irrigation and drainage systems, Tulare was the largest collection of fresh water west of the Mississippi River (about 790 square miles & 30 feet deep). It’s now referred to as a “phantom lake,” though it has flooded partial areas of its previous home a few times since the late 1800’s.

Tulare Lake basin in 1850, prior to manmade canals, etc. (Image obtained from https://www.tularebasinwatershedpartnership.org/history.html)

The lakeshore and its environs supported the Yokut people prior to the arrival of Europeans. The Yokut call the lake Pa’ashi, and they are thought to have been one of the most populous groups of native peoples. They hunted, fished, and foraged in a veritable Eden that supported them year-round.

Tule elk, nearly extinct by the 1870’s. Now numbering around 4000 in the wild, but displaced from the habitat for which they were named. (Image from Wikipedia)

The wetlands that existed in 1850 have since been turned into farmland; fertile lakebed that now supplies much of our supermarket produce.

Tulare Basin, 2000, after the flooding of 1983 had dried up. (Image obtained from https://www.tularebasinwatershedpartnership.org/history.html)

It would be a much longer essay to debate the ethics and ecological consequences of such human endeavors, but I do think it is interesting to consider the geological and historical origins of what we now think of as mere fertile farmland. In the near future, the repercussions of Tulare reclaiming its lakebed will likely affect most of us here in the U.S. via shortages and rising costs of the main crops grown in Central California: tomatoes, almonds, walnuts, & safflower. The Army Corps of Engineers are working to divert the floodwaters, but that won’t solve this season’s crop losses. Here at home, it puts me in mind to grow more tomatoes… Phillip had asked me not to, since we have so many volunteers that pop up anyway. But they do grow so well here!

Every little trip out to the garden in the summertime yields more tomatoes.

The Birds are Back in Town

This week, we have unseasonably warm weather and sunny skies. So glorious! And an endless cacophany chorus of birdsong. We left most of our flowering and native plants in ground in the autumn, so the seeds would be there for food for wildlife. We can look out any of our windows now at any time of day, and see birds pecking away for seeds, bugs, and nesting material from our yard. So many robins (the American kind, as my kids remind me, so actually thrushes), including a very stout one who has returned this year; last year, his body got so plump that he fluttered about like a chicken more than he flew. Sparrows and starlings, of course; a woodpecker who prefers wooden electrical poles to trees; ravens for the first time instead of the ubiquitous crows; hawks; owls, who have returned after an absence, to the irritation of our dog, who barks at their hooting; blue jays, cardinals, and finches. Will any of our berries survive for human consumption this year? In the past 24 hours, there has been a wild turkey running across our neighbors’ yards across the street, and a pair of mallards stopping for a rest in our front yard.

Our morning visitors, a mated pair of mallards.

Or if you prefer to see a video of them adorably waddling around, you can watch the ducks here.

Spring Holidays

This April brings holy days for many, in a rare second consecutive year for the overlap of Passover, Easter, and Ramadan. Generally the 3 major Abrahamic religions share the month for these holidays only once every 33 years. Our family just celebrated the Paschal Triduum (Holy Thursday, Good Friday, & Holy Saturday) which culminates in the Easter Vigil at sunset, otherwise known as lots of days of attending church and a really long late Mass at the end. We had brunch with family on Easter Sunday, and the weather allowed for an outdoor egg hunt and pond fishing at my sister’s.

Daffodil in the back yard on Easter

Happy Holidays to all those observing and celebrating! And Happy Spring to all of us in the Northern Hemisphere! The soil here is warm and (mostly) drained enough to start planting peas and greens in ground outdoors. And if we I start tomato seeds indoors this week, they should be big enough without being leggy by the end of May, when we’ll move the seedlings outside.

How is your spring planting going? How have extremes of weather affected your growing season? What do you think of “phantom lakes” and humans diverting waterways?

—Erin, in Michigan