Squirrel's Ear Day

Like Second Breakfast gives a hobbit's morning a boost,
Squirrel's Ear Day is a boost to the Shaffner spring.
Squirrel's Ear Day is a moveable holiday,
falling on a slightly different day each spring,
somewhat similar to Easter
which is the first Sunday
after the first full moon
after the equinox.
Usually Squirrel's Ear Day,
the day when the oak leaves are as big as a squirrel's ear,
falls in single digit May,
but not this year.
Botanical spring is late on the mountain.

Spring comes sooner in the valleys.
DuBois was built around a beaver meadow wetland
and the streams that feed the wetland have lowland wildflowers.
I made my traditional spring drive to Van Tassel Road on Thursday
to see bloodroot,
dogtooth violets,
spring beauties,
and red and white trilliums.
In our college years,
white trilliums bloomed the week that Houghton's semester was over.
As we drove 219 south through the Allegany Forest,
the hemlocks would have a blanket of white at their feet.
"Trillions of trilliums," Den used to say.

My grandpa Bernie
used to make a yearly spring tonic from sassafras root scrapings
and serve it in chilled aluminum glasses.
One major boost to Den's standing in the Rensel family
was using his dad's tractor to pull sassafras roots out of the ground.
Bernie did not have to use a shovel.
We had his vote from that day on.
A friend gave Den a jar of sassafras tea this week
and the scent alone made me feel like an eight year old again.
I had mine without aluminum this time.

Dandelions and violets began blooming this week in the valley.
I sat my first graders down
on the edge of the playground
for an informal science lesson.
"Dente means tooth in French.
So dente de lion,
dandelion,
means tooth of the lion,"
and we picked dandelion leaves
and held them up to our jaws
and growled ferociously.
I then showed them a violet
and pointed out the pouch-like nectary
where the sweet nectar is stored.
We nibbled the nectaries,
then ate the violets.
They taste a bit like cucumbers.
Two girls spent much of the remainder of recess
prowling around
snacking on violets.
(The next day,
A informed me that he wasn't allowed to eat purple flowers.
Do his parents know what is in school lunches?)

Spring here on the mountain is a bit sparser--
no forsythia blooms this year due to frigid temperatures.
I've walked to the arbutus patch twice so far,
but no blooms.
What we lack in flowers this year, though,
has been made up in birds.
Besides the traditional chickadees,
doves,
finches,
blue jays,
cardinals,
and the misguided redwing
that lurks recent years in the silky dogwood,
this year we have a catbird that yells everything he knows,
a pair of rose-breasted grosbeaks,
and three northern orioles.
Orioles!
Yay!
The boys were babies the last time we had orioles.

And Squirrel's Ear Day?
Today was the first day I noticed a swelling in the oak buds.
Squirrel's Ear Day is coming,
probably some day this week.
We suggest celebrating Squirrel's Ear Day with a second breakfast.