We’ve gained an hour and 9 minutes of light since the winter solstice.

/in , /by
You might also like
Record high temperatures for May were recorded in Burlington (95°) and Saint Johnsbury (92°). On the top of Mount Mansfield it hit 85°. That’s the warmest temperature ever recorded there, on any month, according to a National Weather Service tweet. Fact-check pending.
The beavers on the brook nearby seem to have nestled into their bank den. No tracks in the light snow and no new wood chips on the ground.
A friend and I were trying to decide which birds were the most aggressive at the birdfeeder and we concluded that they all were pretty feisty, from the mourning doves right down to the hummingbirds.
The per day change in day length is at a low around the solstices: it’s changed less than a minute per day since December 9th. Starting today, the increase in day length is more than a minute per day and it’s going to increase to about three minutes a day until we approach the summer solstice.
Both black ash and white ash leaf out much later than most other trees and are now easy to spot. The flattened, tan-colored bark on many ash trees sometimes makes them look like they have a bad case of mange. But this condition is caused by a fungus that just feeds on dead bark and does no harm. Not to be confused with damage from the emerald ash borer.
The berries of red baneberry are ripe, shiny, and bright. But they are named baneberry for a reason.
Unlike many of us humans, rattlesnakes like it hot, especially the females. When pregnant, a female’s body temperature is 6 to 8 degrees C higher than normal, which enables the embryos to develop.
The hard-won snowless ground got a sprinkled coat of snow overnight. The juncos are easy to see now, but still too many to count.