Amidst the snow and bitter cold of January, a new gardening season takes shape in our minds. I reckon that the severity of Maine winters accounts in no small way for the ardent interest we take in planning the next all too brief growing season. If we lived in Florida and were faced with a 12-month gardening season, might we not feel it a chore to keep the garden watered and weeded without a break?

Beyond the longing for summer engendered by New England winters, other things contribute to the lifelong interest in gardening that is the norm for most people with green thumbs. New introductions crowd the pages of mail order catalogs, tempting us to consider a new bed or mini-orchard, and testifying to the undying efforts of plant breeders. Indeed, the age of genetic engineering promises almost unimaginable advances in humankind’s molding and remolding of the plant kingdom. Perhaps we will even live to see that most illusive goal of floral breeding — a yellow impatiens.

Ultimately, though, it is not mere novelty that annually rekindles a gardener’s heart. It is nature itself. Nature, the perfect combination of predictability and surprise, keeps this gardener, at least, always alert and vigilant to see what comes next.

For example, there is the amusing if frustrating winter pastime of trying to guess what the deer will eat next. For years it seemed that the local herd was operating on some sort of perverse timetable. Their munchings on azalea and magnolia buds, daphne twigs, evergreen perennials like dianthus and yucca, and let’s not forget every single strawberry leaf, were predictable, almost to the day of the week.

Then last year the system seemed to fall apart. It began in midsummer, when the neighborhood marauders failed to notice how nice and succulent the hostas were. Later, when a bumper crop of apples began to drop, we noted that few of them disappeared or were replaced by the little brown berries one associates with Bambi (or by the larger scat of our once faithful bear family). Other omissions followed, culminating in the most spectacular non-event of all — no deer damage to the azaleas. 1993 was the first time we had seen all the colors bloom in the same year.

Where did the deer go? A neighbor believes that they were attracted to a new crop of tender tree tops created nearby by wood harvesters. I like to think that the deer are suffering from something more akin to the current human problem of not passing on the basics to the next generation.

Since time immemorial deer made it their business to keep a mental inventory of all the tasty plants in their territory. Does and bucks felt it their solemn duty to pass on this skill to fawns and yearlings.

Then some trend or fashion swept through the world deer inhabit. Suddenly the youngsters lost interest in learning the ways of their elders. Or maybe the pressures of raising a family and staying one step ahead of the hunters combined to interrupt the educational process. In any event, I feel certain that all the deer in my neighborhood have lost the knowledge of which plants in our garden are most delectable and nutritious. Not!

Just give them time and the local neophyte deer population will learn for themselves how really tasty are the most expensive, slowest-growing and hardest-to-replace garden plants. It’s part of the predictable-unpredictable cycle of nature. It goes right along with droughts that are followed by floods and cold springs that turn instantly into record-breaking June heat waves.

Now, what puzzles me most about nature’s changeability at the moment is where all the birds are that frequented our feeders last winter? Day in and day out, all I see are the same six chickadees. How I miss the gold finches, purple finches, pine siskins, chipping sparrows, redpoles, nuthatches and occasional cardinals of years gone by.

Michael Zuck of Bangor is a horticulturist and the NEWS garden columnist. Send inquiries to him at 2106 Essex St., Bangor, Maine 04401.