False Spring and the Dying Gasp of Winter

Have you been hibernating? It’s a smart choice, but time to wake up. The geese are back.

I’ve been courting Canada geese since moving to this farm. There is a trail of streams and ponds that crosses my Colorado prairie, enabling me to have rare waterfront property. I was thinking I’d be watching sunsets over Pikes Peak, but it ended up that I fell prey to migrating birds. All kinds from hawks to herons. Great Horned owls to gazillions of murmuring blackbirds. In the end, my most coveted birds were also some of the most common.

At first, the Canada geese teased me. Pairs would march around the pond, check the closet space and if the kitchen had state-of-the-art appliances. Meanwhile, I’d pace the other bank, muttering, “Pick me, pick me.” There were dozens of broods of ducklings here, but invariably, the geese picked the pond down the road, as if it was in a better school district. As if my farm was a terrible neighborhood for goslings.

Finally, a pair nested. And returned the next year. You don’t recognize Canada Geese by their markings. They are very consistent in their coloring. It’s their habits that let me know it was the same pair. They have a particular way of waddling about in the Infinity Farm Wildlife Preserve. Meaning our two acre weed pasture. Sometimes, they spend time on top of my horse trailer. They are lovely from any angle. When the goslings hatch, they herd their babies in the middle of the pond, safe from coyotes. I call them Liam and Alberta. They are a monogamous couple and fierce parents. They have returned several years now. Canada geese can live up to 25 years.

During drought years, the pond is a puddle. All the birds stay away. Another year, a flash flood washed their nest away. Neighbor kids run them off with chaos and noise some years. Last year was the worst when the Rottweilers next-door slaughtered their goslings. I worried it would really be the end. That they would never come back. I know they are not my geese, any more than the horses or mice are mine.

Finally, the sun was warming, and we had a few balmy days last week. Snow soaked into the ground instead of blowing away. The horses turned circles and pawed until the soil was just right, and let the earth cradle them to sleep. The two previous miserable weeks, with days and nights below zero, left their muscles were tired from bracing. After a nap, the horses rolled to adjust their backs and used the dirt to scratch their necks. And they napped a little longer.

I was mucking and admiring Edgar Rice Burro, as he hollered out a yodeling bray and farted like an old man. His rickety old fetlocks must ache, but he is our moral compass. Every farm has one. As I daydreamed and shoveled, I saw it. Just a corner of the pond melted. Spring! I mounted my ATV sidesaddle and headed out to the Preserve to spread the manure.

Hallelujah, Liam and Alberta were back. I’d know them anywhere. They honked at me like I was intruding on a private conversation and I slunk down to the far fence line to do my business. Old friends give me hope and I smiled as wide as a carton of eggs.

My farm is a boundary zone, where wild and tame mingle, nevermind the fences. At one of my clinics in Australia, horses and kangaroos shared the same shade trees in the paddocks. It isn’t so exotic at my farm, but the same blurred boundaries exist. Deer out the bathroom window. Rabbits hiding under the hay pallets. Sparrows in the rafters. We have a couple of huge flies in the house, sounding like tiny WWII bomber planes. I’m the DEI hire. It’s not political, just plain obvious looking around.

A farm is like a country with many peoples. Some migrate. Others, like the dogs, never leave my side. There is even room for those who just don’t fit anywhere. I’m practically their patron saint, but that’s only because I didn’t always have a home.

I’ve been trying to wear down a feral ginger barn cat for a few months. My dog, Mister, has a special bark to let me know when he’s coming. As if by appointment, the cat meets me at the night feed and I put out a fresh bowl of kibble. His eyes glow in my headlamp. Sometimes he lurks, waiting to eat until I go. Or he might act as if I don’t exist, walking a straight line to dinner, right past me, looking neither right nor left. I think we both know I want to befriend him to get him neutered.

He eats, but always leaves some scraps for the mice. Predators and prey share this farm, wary adversaries. Then this ginger cat strolls out in the open, digs a hole half the size of his body, and relieves himself. He systematically scrapes dirt over his waste, leaving a colossal claw-mark halo around the spot. I’ve seen smaller burial mounds. Irresistible. He makes monuments to his poop.

Going into winter, I thought to bribe him with a bit of comfort and set up an insulated cat house, along with two self-heating pads. Maybe he would perch on the haystack out of the wind during the coldest months. He used it as a litter box. Just a hint of how he became a wanderer. He continues his belligerent refusal to have a name.

This pre-vernal time, when grass is just beginning to twitch underground, I am not naïve. I understand as well as any goose that these warm days are only False Spring. The deep, wet snows are still ahead. Mother Nature sends us a Cheat Spring to trick us into thinking we don’t need three layers. She hopes our winter toughness will melt away and we’ll whine about cold feet at the next dusting of snow. Call it Fool’s Spring, but I’ll take it.

The coldest, darkest nights are behind us. We survived. Stop bracing for the worst. It’s time to get back to work. It might not look like much, but we’ve spent the best years of our lives building this farm. A few of us are buried here. We are a winter-worn society of reprobates, blue-ribbon rebels, and heroes past our prime, but we’ve never been quitters.

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