April 10-16, 2017

 

If you would draw closer to Nature, age with Nature. Find a portion of the raw world that is nearby. Adopt it. Your concern for the fate of Nature can be played out and developed through the degree of care you devote to this one tiny area of the whole … No matter how small an area it may be, it creates particular harmonics that ripple across your common time and space.

-Peter London, Drawing Closer to Nature

 

 

Moon time: The Apple Blossom Moon, full on April 11 at 1:08 a.m., wanes gibbous through its thirdquarter, reaching apogee (its position furthest from Earth) on April 15 and coming into its final phase at 4:57 a.m. on April 19. Rising in the evening and setting after sunrise, this moon brightens the night throughout the period.

 

Sun time: By April 16, the sun reaches a declination of 10 degrees; that’s about 40 percent of the way to summer solstice. Star time: Before sunrise, Hercules has moved to near the center of the sky. The summer triangle, which includes bright Vega, Altair and Deneb, are just a little behind Hercules to his east. The Milky Way passes through the triangle, separating it from autumn’s Pegasus rising on the eastern horizon. The Corona Borealis has shifted into the western half of the heavens, and the pointers of the Big Dipper point almost exactly east-west.

 

Shooting star time: The Lyrid Meteors are active after midnight between Cygnus and Hercules during the second and third week of April, peaking on April 22- 23. These shooting stars often appear at the rate of 15-25 per hour.

 

Weather time

Even though the normal average air temperature rises at the rate of about 1 degree every three days once the April 11 front passes through, full moon on this date is likely to bring frost on flowering fruit trees throughout the region. Precipitation typically occurs as the April 16 front races across the United States.

 

After the front passes, however, expect

warm weather to nurture your earlyApril plantings. Lunar apogee on April 15 is likely to increase chances for mild temperatures.

 

Chances for snow and frost in the Midwest recede quickly after the April 21 front comes through. Winds and hard rain, however, continue to threaten young plantings, kids, lambs and calves.

 

Throughout the northern half of the country, forsythia, crabapples, dandelions, fruit trees, wild mustards, honeysuckles, Russian olives, redbuds, magnolias, ground ivy and poppies are ordinarily blooming.

 

Honeysuckles and spicebushes have developed enough to turn the undergrowth pale green, and color rises through the woodlots and fencerows. Daffodils, Dutchman’s britches, violetcress, toad trillium, rue anemone, spring beauty, star of Holland, Virginia bluebells, toothwort and hepatica are at the height of their bloom.

 

Cowslip, trout lily, Greek valerian, thyme leafed speedwell, watercress, violets, jack-in-the-pulpit, woodland phlox, ragwort, wild ginger and early tulips open.

 

Farm and garden time Although frost is still possible for another month, it is also possible there will be no serious freeze between now and summer.

 

Put in some sweet corn directly in the ground, for sure. Try several hills of squash and your first rows of beans. If you have beehives, check to make sure bees are carrying in pollen. Bees need pollen to raise larvae, and without it, they will not raise enough bees to gather the summer honey crop. If they are not bringing in enough pollen, feed a pollen substitute.

 

And when you see the white flowers of garlic mustard flowering in the woods, look for cutworms and sod webworms to start taking over the field and garden. Weevils are showing up in the alfalfa, too.

 

Marketing time: This is the week of New Year’s Day for immigrants from Cambodia, Thailand and Laos, as well as Easter for Christians. If you missed this market in 2017, plan ahead for 2018.

 

 

Now that most everything is getting green and flowering, no one can hide behind winter hibernation and almost everyone has made the psychological transition to a springtime attitude.

 

Take advantage of the excitement, optimism and energy of that mindset by increasing your time out-of-doors, starting new projects, making vacation plans, popping the question and other things that require faith and a positive outlook on life.

 

 Creature time (for fishing, hunting, feeding, bird watching): The moon’s position overhead throughout the night will favor fishing (but not dieting) from dusk to dawn. 

Scouting for turkeys could be best at the second-best lunar time, during the afternoons.

 

Bird watchers may see new house wrens, brown thrashers, towhees and chipping sparrows.

 

 

Bean Planting Secrets By Pliny Fulkner

 

Hard Luck Farm, W.Va.

 

I have found that soil temperatures generally follow the normal average air temperatures within maybe 10 degrees. But in the spring and early summer, the ground often lags behind the weather, causing considerable anguish to the farmer and gardener.

 

For example, if your beans go in before the earth is warm enough, they rot where you lay them. “Nothing sprouts,” says the Greek sage Theophrastus, “before its proper time.”

 

On the other hand, two old-time suggestions may be useful in helping you decide when to plant.

 

The first, from an ancient English herbal, is popular but tricky: “The best of growers have the seedsman go unclad to sow the field.”

 

As long as the feet are bare, too, the technique can be quite effective; remember, however, the soil is what you want to check, not the air.

 

To be on the safe side, you may wish to conduct a more reliable and potentially less controversial soil test from this clever verse by the Marquis de Croissant (1834-97): “If the ground be warm to the derriere, ‘twill surely give thee beans to spare.” 

 

Poor Will pays $4 for your memory stories used in this column. Send it to Poor Will’s Almanack at P.O. Box 431, Yellow Springs, OH 45387 or to wlfelker@gmail.com Listen to Poor Will’s “Radio Almanack” on podcast anytime at www.wyso.org