Ahhh March! March brings the vernal equinox, when the length of day and night is nearly equal in all parts of the world.  March brings such promise of spring!  We’ve been watching for the signs.  Emergence seems a little later this year.

We’ve been longing for March’s gradually longer and occasional warm days.

Before we know it we’ll be seeing the green shoots reaching for the solar beam and smelling skunk cabbage.  We’ll be noticing  swollen buds on flowering trees.

We’ll be admiring the beauty of hellebores, bringing in pussy willow branches and forcing forsythia and lilacs.

We’ll be seeing planted and “surprise” perennial bulbs of snow drops, daffodils, crocus and iris.

Soon there’ll be the return of songbirds and we’ll be observing nest building and searching for eggs.

If you allow yourself to be in a position to notice, worms and grubs will be reappearing on the earth’s surface and we’ll hope to catch a glimpse of the Worm Moon near month’s end.

We may not be seeing it but there is a lot of hidden activity; tree roots are busy moving nutrients and water from the soil up to the rest of the tree. We’ll be wondering if the sap is running  *(see massmaple.org and Maple Week at South Shore Natural Science Center) .

We hope you’ll join us for our celebration of the season starting with planting at Maribett Farm on the first day of spring.  Then later in the season, we’ll be celebrating new life with goats, lambs and chickens and then more planting around the Summer Solstice in June. We’ll be doing something (s) beautiful!  Check out our Experiences Worth Sharing calendar of events…You come too…

If you look up IMBOLC on the internet, you will find many things but my favorite item of significance is that it is meant to mark the halfway point between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox.

Among other things, it is said to be the day when the seeds begin to turn under the ground, reaching toward the sun; heralding the change of seasons.

Some people note a bit of a shift of the smell in the air.

How about you? What do you notice as a harbinger of spring?