The first robin of the year greeted us outside of the kitchen window.  In the meanwhile a flock of juncos pecked the ground around the cabin-looking for the last of the grass seed we sowed last summer.  The bathroom window is open.  The house is breathing fresh air.  Osier Creek is flowing- cascading amongst the mire of rhyolite along it's graceful journey to Lake Superior.

Our lower culvert remains frozen.  One would think that after a decade in the water business I would have a better grasp on the spring runoff of my own property.  I''d be lying if I said that I did.  With the frozen pipe we are a matter of inches of flooding out the base of our driveway.  Good thing that now a days it takes a lot to get me worried.  When living in the woods and building you learn very fast to roll with the punches because if you get phased by the first one you'll surely get knocked out by the one to come.  Instead I'm chipping ice and building up our ditches.

Down by the lake Mountain Ash has begun to bud.  Canadian geese fly north to their nesting grounds in the Canadian wilderness.  Snowshoe hare are almost completely summer brown.  Chickadees, juncos, yellow-rumped warblers continue their endless assault on the bird feeder.  There is bear scat on the Arrowhead Trail.  I spotted a Moose licking salt on the Gunflint Trail.

Albeit later than average, spring has finally come to the north woods!

Penelope loves mud season!