The March into March

 Monday Feb 22

Sunny, and 11c high. Went for a bike ride, my threshold to switch from walking to cycling is a 10c day. 

Nice sitting outside on the first day that the crocuses flowered. Felt so motivated, I even pulled a few weeds from the pots. I'm getting good at one handed gardening, holding a glass of wine in one hand and gardening with the other. 

Tuesday Feb 23 

A strange weather day.  Cold overnight, so some frost in the morning, but it was sunny.  

You can see two Canada geese on the greens, that showed up a couple of weeks ago, waiting for the rest of the flock to arrive. Normally we see about 20 or more  nesting by the pond on the course.  Won't be too much longer.  In cities, Canada geese stay around all year but on the island we still have the migrating geese. 

We got a hail storm mid morning! 

Also, the robins have arrived today! First day they have been in our territory although I have seen them around in my walks. We'll see them every day from now until around June, They search for nesting  material, look after their young and then move on. 

For anyone curious about what you should do with left over tree stumps... just let them lie.  

There was a large flood a year or so ago that caused a local road to collapse into a tributary of French Creek.  It was a large project to fix it. In remediation, they pulled down a number of trees whose roots had been compromised and...left them.  

In a few years, nature will regenerate them, they will become "nurse logs" for other plants to grow in them, animals will shelter and they will break  the force of rushing water if another flood occurs. 

Saturday February 27

We made an impromptu visit to a park in Nanaimo for a picnic, found spring flowers in bloom. 

I came across this burst pipe on one of my walks, spewing some ugly rusty water into a ditch.  Emailed the District of Nanaimo who is responsible for the water systems. 

And I was treated to an eagle circling over my head.