SPRING’S REALLY COMING

Don’t let the snow and the low temperatures fool you. Spring is coming. The signs are everywhere, if you just know where to look, how to listen and even how to smell.

The birds know before we do that spring is on its way. Chickadees have been singing for a couple of weeks, says University of Maine biology Professor Rebecca Holberton. She has already seen a few robins, though not yet the big flocks. She says those vees in the sky won’t appear until the ice breaks up and the lake waters are clear.

At the Fields Pond Audubon Center, Director Judy Markowsky sees the arrival of the love bug as a special sign of approaching spring. She says the chickadees are singing their spring courting song, a two-tone “fee-bee” that is quite different from the later “chickadee-dee-dee.”

She notes that house finches are already singing, owls are beginning to hoot their mating calls, and male pigeons are puffing up and strutting about to impress the females. Look for a pair of fox tracks paralleling each other as further evidence of pre-spring courting. Even road kill is a sign of spring. The sight of a dead ground hog on the highway or the first smell of a squashed skunk means that those animals have aroused and gone out seeking mates.

Merchants, of course, always plan ahead of time for spring. Easter displays are already in place, and fuzzy bunnies have popped up in the supermarkets. Many motorists seem to have a spring rite of buying a new car, so a rash of cardboard temporary license plates is now appearing.

Maine’s spring starts in the south and marches northward. A pair of nesting Canada geese has just been sighted along the Kennebec River. Some redwing blackbirds have been spotted near York.

So spring is really on its way. But don’t put away the earmuffs and heavy gloves and snow shovels and windshield scrapers just yet. We could still have more cold and snow before the season actually arrives. In the meantime, enjoy the brisk days of late winter, with bright blue sky as background for the dark green spruces and pines, with some remaining snow and ice for contrast.

And something to look forward to is the Fields Pond’s nature walk at 2 p.m. March 28, starting at the center in Holden. This year’s theme will be “Spring is really here.”