Signs of spring

Traditionally, seeing your first robin of the season is a sure sign of spring. For me, though, I've seen robins in every month of the year - not in any one year, but over the years. Since I've seen robins even in January, it's hard to say the seeing a robin signals spring's arrival. But I did see a song sparrow today, and hearing its song certainly made me feel that winter was ending. For the last few years, the most welcome sign of spring is hearing the toads' mating calls as they gather in our pond. It may not be the first sign of spring, since it happens in April, but it's surely joyful! Meanwhile, the most important thing I'm doing as I wait for spring's official arrival is to monitor selected shrubs for their first leaf bud to burst out as part of Project Budburst. Project Budburst is a citizen science project that collects data on plant phenology (life cycle events) for selected plants. In my yard, I'm monitoring serviceberry, bearberry, flowering dogwood, red twig dogwood and others - even the first dandelion.