The mud zone & the birds

Ewww...clay sticks to everything

It looks like spring might actually get here sometime this month, but I’m still not holding my breath as temperatures are still below freezing at night. A lot of snow has melted throughout the yard and that’s a good thing. However, spring thaw can also be a tense time of year.

We waited in anticipation to hear the first hum of the sump pump kicking in and roughly kept track of how often the pump came on, drawing water out of the pit into the long pipe that carries ground water more than 30 feet across the front yard.

We tested the backup pump, too, that’s connected to an enclosed marine battery in the event of a power failure. Anything can happen and especially at this time of year, a sump pump failure would cause major basement flooding. The backup system gives us piece of mind.

For several days last week, the sump pump kicked on every five minutes, but today it’s about every 40-45 minutes, so most of the thawed snow around the house has seeped down through the clay and weeping tile. So far, there are no visible leaks in the basement. This year’s tasks will include building up and grading soil around the outside foundation and spreading grass seed to help direct water away from the foundation.

It’s a mucky, sticky mess around parts of yards because we had about 10 dump truck loads of soil-clay delivered last fall to spread and grade along the foundation, but it was too late in the year to spread grass seed. The greasy red clay clings to everything. Boots get very heavy and cumbersome while plodding through the ankle deep muck. It’s not a pretty sight. Once the grass grows in those areas, we won’t have this problem.

I nearly face planted in the deep quicksand-like muck on my way to the bird feeders and to toss some cabbage leaves into the nearby forest area where I’d seen a rabbit last week.

This poor plump Robin was all by himself.

From a window, I had been watching the squirrels, one brave Robin, some chickadees, a pair of Blue Jays and a few Black Eyed Juncos pecking at the ground searching for black oil sunflower seeds. Deer have been by licking up most of the seeds from the short grass.

Luckily, I had a shovel in my hand and used it to balance myself while one of my boots got stuck in the muck. It’s impossible to be graceful in that stuff.

The bird feeder area was busy today.

I didn’t have high hopes that spring is really here after seeing the forecast for this week, but after Robin showed up I thought that maybe, just maybe it’s a sign that winter is finally on its way out. Otherwise, that poor bugger should have stayed south where it was warm since the worms are still frozen in the clay around the yard. Summer is still two months away.

Artichoke sprout.

On a positive note, seven of the artichoke seeds that I sowed last week have sprouted, including the one I’ve kept upstairs. I have created life!