Tag Archives: spring

LOON SONG

THEY SAY SPRING ADVANCES fifteen miles a day, about the pace of a steady walk, which explains why I could experience three springs that year. The first was in March, in Ohio, on the shore of Lake Erie’s Maumee Bay, where I stayed in a small cabin near the bay to watch new grass sprouting in farmers’ fields and the broad-winged hawks that congregate in kettles high overhead. I counted a couple hundred broad-wings one day, which I thought was spectacular, but a local birder said they sometimes numbered in the tens of thousands—entire galaxies of spiral formations spinning slowly northward with the wind. In the marshes and woodlots were other early migrants: red-winged blackbirds, yellow-rumped warblers, ruby- and golden-crowned kinglets, and a brown thrasher that perched on the topmost branch of a tree beside my cabin one morning and performed tireless variations on the theme of “Here I am, look at me!”

Three weeks later, as I drove home, those same birds were showing up 300 miles north, in the northern Lower Peninsula of Michigan. The snow had finally left our yard and the woods out back, and forsythia and trillium were starting to blossom. Suddenly trout were feeding on mayflies in the rivers, morels were popping beneath the aspens, and butter-butts and kinglets were flitting among the bare branches of the trees.

Then it was time for the third spring, so I drove north again, crossed the Mackinac Bridge to the Upper Peninsula, and followed a network of gravel roads until I banged up against the shore of Superior. I had the key to a friend’s cabin, but I had to shovel the snow away before I could reach the door. The ice was off the big lake—it was brilliant blue water to the horizon—but stranded on the beach were remnant icebergs spangled with sand. I looked up and saw two dozen broad-winged hawks circling high overhead, waiting for a south wind to carry them across the lake to Ontario.

Spring is the most complicated season. It arrives pulling a clanging train of machinery, and we realize that the name we’ve given it is all wrong. It doesn’t spring, it saunters—two steps forward, one back—and often it retreats like a child in a sulk and we have to wait a few days or a week before it returns.

One morning I stepped from my friend’s cabin on Lake Superior and was met by the first warm wind of the season.  A familiar call sounded high overhead and I looked up to see a loon hurtling past, bound for Canada. Then came another, and another, each trailing its ululating warble.

It was the clarion announcement, the emblem of the wild north, a song that stirs primordial urges in many of us who cherish unspoiled places. It’s the music of mist-shrouded lakes deep in the spruce forest, a boreal timelessness that is perhaps best heard from a canoe. Coming from the sky above Superior it was this and more: the sound of wildness in transit, winging north with the lengthening days of this season of hope.



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SPRING ARRIVES!

Ah, the season of promise. Is it any wonder we grow impatient for it in March, when the last winter storms close roads and snap trees beneath their weight? We step outside hoping to hear the bassoon rumble of frogs mating in the neighbor’s pond—and instead are struck by a cold wind from the north and a rattling of sleet.

Art by Glenn Wolff www.glennwolff.com

art by Glenn Wolff
www.glennwolff.com

I remember a spring many years ago that arrived more slowly than most. It was 1979, the year that 32 feet of snow fell on the Keweenaw Peninsula and a succession of blizzards swept across the U.S. and Canada, shutting down cities from the Rockies to the East Coast. I was a student at Northern Michigan University in Marquette, and watched with astonishment as the temperature plummeted to 20 then 30 then 50 below zero. Lake Superior froze from shore to shore that year, and snow banks rose so high that pedestrians could touch the telephone wires.

By April everyone was eager for spring, but the wait became discouraging. I walked to school every day and noticed that the buds on the trees and shrubs remained tight as fists. The snow settled to a few feet of dirty crust, but would melt no further. The days stayed a cheerless 25 degrees, and the nights fell to the teens. The sky stayed dark and cloud-covered.

The last Saturday of the month, the opening day of trout season, I drove to a stretch of river I had discovered the previous summer. It was in a secret valley of cedars, and getting there required a long walk over ice-crusted snow with my unstrung fly rod in hand. When I reached the river it was flowing high, dark, and dangerous. I walked the bank, pretending to look for trout, but watching, in truth, for spring.

It arrived in the afternoon, when the clouds parted for a few minutes and an ice dam upstream burst, sending a knee-high wave of ice and slush surging toward me. The river rose two feet in five minutes and changed to the color of freshly stomped puddles. The sun broke free and birds began to sing. Hope surged through my veins and I hurried to string up my fly rod, attach a bead-head nymph, and roll some casts across the murky water. No trout showed themselves, but I didn’t expect them to. After a few minutes the sun disappeared behind clouds, the birds went silent, and my ears burned with cold again. But no matter— spring had arrived, with fanfare.

(First published in Jerry’s column, “Reflections,” in Michigan Blue Magazine)

 



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SPRING: LOON CALL

They say spring advances fifteen miles a day, the pace of a leisurely walk, which is why I could experience three springs last year. The first was in March, in Ohio, on the shore of Lake Erie’s Maumee Bay, where new grass was sprouting in farmers’ fields and clusters of broad-winged hawks circled overhead in kettles. I counted 200 broad-wings one day, but a local birder said they sometimes numbered in the tens of thousands and even hundreds of thousands—whole galaxies of hawks spiraling slowly northward with the wind. In the marshes and woodlots were other early migrants—red-winged blackbird, yellow-rumped warbler, ruby-crowned kinglet, and a brown thrasher that perched at the top of a tree beside my cabin for an hour and performed tireless variations of “Here I am, look at me.”

Three weeks later, those same birds were showing up 300 miles north, near Traverse City. The snow was finally gone from the woods; forsythia and trilliums were in bloom. Suddenly morels were popping beneath the aspens and trout were gobbling mayflies in the rivers.

Then it was time for the third spring, so I drove north again, crossed the Mackinac Bridge into the Upper Peninsula, and followed county roads until I banged up against the shore of Superior. I had the key to a friend’s cabin but had to shovel a drift away from the door before I could open it. Remnant bergs sat melting on the beach. Overhead the sky was stacked with hawks waiting for a south wind to carry them across the big lake.

Spring is the most complicated season. It arrives with reluctance, pulling its clanking train of machinery, and we recognize that the name we’ve given it is all wrong. It doesn’t spring, it creeps, two steps forward and one back—and often it backs off entirely and you have to wait a  few days or a week before it tiptoes forward again.

One morning I stepped from the cabin to listen to those clanking gears and turning wheels and caught the first warm wind of the season. A familiar warbling call sounded high overhead and I looked up to see a loon hurtling past, bound for Canada. Then came another, and another, each making its ululating call.

This was the clarion announcement, the very emblem of the wild north, a song that has always stirred something deep in the souls of those who value solitude and unspoiled places. It’s the music of mist-shrouded lakes and tannin-colored ponds, a boreal timelessness best heard from a canoe. But coming from the sky above Superior it was the sound of a different wildness, one in transit, like us, winging northward into the lengthening days of the season of hope.



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