Opening Day in the Woods!

A tiny Spring Peeper (Pseudacris crucifer) rests on a withering fern before re-joining the chorus of mate-seeking throngs in the pond.

The Spring Peepers in the Skidmore Woods must have gotten the message: April is National Frog Month.  Time to wake up and sing! Just two days ago, all was silent out there, but today the shrill chorus of the Peepers was nearly ear-splitting.  Not a "quack" from the Wood Frogs, yet, but just wait.  The ice on their pond is melted around the edges, and I bet that racket the Peepers are shrilling will wake them up any time now.

The Round-lobed Hepaticas must have received a wake-up call, too, for the same plant that showed only furry buds yesterday was full of wide-open flowers today.

Round-lobed Hepatica (Hepatica americana) is one of our earliest wildflowers to bloom in the Spring.

And here came another newly awakened denizen of the spring woods, a beautiful Mourning Cloak Butterfly, fluttering through the trees and now and then settling down in a pool of sunlight to gather energy from the sun's warming rays. This is one of our very few butterflies that winters over as an adult, emerging from its shelter as soon as the sap starts to drip from the trees.

The Mourning Cloak Butterfly (Nymphalis antiopa), newly emerged from its winter slumber, soaks up warmth from the sun.

I heard from some friends in the Midwest that it's snowing hard out there today. I sure hope that that snowstorm wears itself out before it approaches us.  At least we now have genuine proof that Spring is here for real, no matter what!