What are the most noticeable signs, where you live, of an impending Springtime?
One big one where I live is the exponentially expanding minefield of half thawed dog poop emerging from being entombed in an icy grave all winter.
Smell that country air! Watch your step!

"I "Love Summer more than I hate Winter"

My beautiful red tulips are beginning to sprout, despite the forcasted snow. I've yet to see any daffodills in bloom yet, except on vacation in Texas, where it is spring a one month before it is spring here.

Snowdrops, winter aconite, then daffs.

And the realisation that I should have sent the lawn mowers for servicing last month. :-(

Blooming ornamental pear trees Last year they were shredded by a hail storm.

           Springtime One<br />

Spring is here, I know it now,
For I just saw a flying cow.
Its wings spread wide, its hooves all splayed,
It soared way up as it played.

Higher and higher it flew up,
But there there was no grass to sup
So, down and down it came so fast,
I saw it good as it flew past.

And now each time that Spring comes round,
I'll listen hard to hear that sound.
It's that mooing up in the air,
The flying cow is in its lair.
.

E.J. Lewis

I looked at my plum tree last night, and it had burst into bloom. I swear those blossoms weren't there yesterday.

pam

Here in New York we had crocuses springing, buds on trees, bits of green poking up everywhere...

and then three days of snowfall.

I wasn't fooled by the early warm. My rule is: It doesn't matter how warm it gets, or what blooms, or even what the calendar says. It's not really spring until the yard sales appear.

Jean-Paul, it's been in the high 70's for going on 4 weeks, spring fever has definitely set in. I'm thinking of going to the beach for a few days.

Here the spring arrives when the first wild poppies and daffodils bloom in the hills. That is occuring now. It's great to see wild flowers in bloom wherever they are.

Les

Linda you are clever with that poem.

Me...ahhh...this weekend I uncovered my gardens! Layers of wet leaves and dry leaves, and to my pleasant suprise everything is popping up! I have 2 white hyacinths in bloom and a few more almost. My tulips are nearly 8" tall, even the irises and hostas are popping up. I planted seeds in a min-greenhouse, set it in my windowsill and in just 3 days I saw God's creation poking through! Is there anything more wonderful?

This morning I let my overly-plump black cat, Pluto, in (yes, I named him after the Edgar Allen Poe story) and he had bird feathers stuck to his face. Now, it's spring.

The rainy season. There's nothing like waking up to the sound of rain pouring down. Likewise there's nothing better to fall asleep to.

dolphin

My friends in Minnesota say they have only two seasons there:
WINTER and ROAD CONSTRUCTION.

They don't have any SIGNS OF SPRING, but they know that winter is over when the orange cones appear.

Well, I saw yard sales yesterday!

pam:

in olkahoma, the earliest flowers are the bluette, veronica (blue speedwell) and spring beauty (claytonia). you and your plum tree are not alone:

Metamorphosis

Always it happens when we are not there -
The tree leaps up alive in the air,
Small open parasols of Chinese green
Wave on each twig. But who has ever seen
The latch sprung, the bud as it burst?
Spring always manages to get there first.

Lovers of wind, who will have been aware
Of a faint stirring in the empty air,
Look up one day through a dissolving screen
To find no star, but this multiplied green,
Shadow on shadow, singing sweet and clear.
Listen, lovers of wind, the leaves are here.!!

May Sarton

"Spring always manages to get there first."

Lovely!

I have a special fondness and admiration for poets who can speak like real people speaking, while at the same time keeping to the rhyme and meter they've chosen.