2-23-2026 9:19pm

Is It Spring Yet?

Beth Callahan Editor

Nature Close to Home and Ohio Certified Volunteer Naturalist Dave Woehr shares monthly naturalist stories.

WARREN COUNTY, OH -- It has been a winter to remember. With more snow than usual accompanied by long stretches of below normal temperatures, most of us are ready for spring. But, it’s still February, and spring is still another month away according to the calendar. Fortunately, Mother Nature doesn’t pay much attention to the calendar. She goes about making plans for spring even though it’s still the dead of winter.

If you are a careful observer you can find encouraging signs of spring showing up even now. Leaf buds are beginning to swell on some of the trees, and the sugar maples are beginning to produce the sap from which pancake syrup is made.

One of our earliest spring wildflowers, the Skunk Cabbage, can often be found poking through the snow in wet lowland areas.

On warm, rainy nights, mole salamanders will migrate from their underground living quarters to the vernal ponds where they will mate and lay eggs.

There they will share the space with many species of frogs that also breed just as winter winds down.

I have long associated the impending end of winter with the arrival of Red-winged Blackbirds returning to our area. I observed my first one of the new year at the backyard feeder this past week. Several other local birdwatchers reported similar sightings.

A Bald Eagle is currently incubating eggs in her nest along the Little Miami River near Morrow.

These are just a few of the encouraging signs of spring to be found if you look carefully for them. Is it spring yet? Not quite, but almost. And that’s enough for me to start thinking about shopping for the flower and vegetable seeds I want to plant in the gardens this year!