At the time the newsletter with this blog is delivered to your inbox, it is April, and it is springtime all over! And I’m soooo happy about it! We have had a prolonged period with more or less a record of sunless or sun-deficient days. And in spite of my intention not to care that much (see my piece from last December); I felt it anyway, at one point. And that my newspaper offered a scientific explanation for the phenomenon (warmer seawater equals more evaporation, equals more moisture in the air, equals cloudy conditions and/or fog) was only of limited consolation. And I was not alone in this. The app for my solar panels, for instance, came to tell me at one point that they were seriously questioning the mere meaning of their existence.
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Meteorological v Astronomical Spring
Did you know, by the way, that the larger scientific community recognizes two different beginnings of springtime? Indeed, (for the northern hemisphere), the meteorologists have spring begin on March 1 (and summer on June 1, and so on). Astronomers, on the other hand, set the beginning of springtime at the moment the sun crosses the equator northward. So sometime around March 20 or 21. The so-called “astronomical spring”. For those who love details, this year, in the CET time zone, that moment occurred on March 20 at 10:01 am. The astronomical summer begins with the solstice in June and counting.
Whatever your definition: springtime can definitively no longer be ignored! The crocuses and hyacinths are out, and the buds of the trees are swelling or already opening. The stork’s nest just outside my neighborhood is occupied once again. The local frogs may have a point or two for the discussion when they learn about this, but it does cheer me up. The chickadee box in my backyard too seems to have found new tenants, and anyway: it’s chirping, tweeting and singing again in the local bird community. I also notice the ‘spring feeling’ among my friends and colleagues. People are walking more upright again, and the greetings do sound far more energetic than they did a month or so ago.
Credit: Carlos Delgado (Wikimedia Commons)
Bird Magic
Speaking of ‘birds’: some time ago, I came across a very nice app that is all about birds. That app is called “Merlin”, as in the wizard from the sagas of King Arthur. The app is issued by the Department of Ornithology (bird science) of Cornell University. Once installed on your phone or tablet, you can have the Merlin app listen to the birds in your surroundings. And as it listens, it produces a list of the birds it hears, noting how often it hears which bird.
Then you can click one of those birds, and ask the app what that particular bird sounds like. It will give you a demo of the bird’s song or sound, accompanied by pictures and lots of other information. If you manage to photograph your feathered visitors, you can also upload that photo into the app and ask which bird it is. The app speaks multiple languages, and you can choose to have the Latin name of the bird(s) spelt out as well.
You can create lists of observed birds in the app. If you give the app permission to do so, you can also share the observed birds with the eBird database that Cornell maintains, so you are also contributing to worldwide sightings and research. #CitizenScience. I would say: how much fun is that!!!
The Merlin app is available for IOS and Android.
That’s it for now. I wish you thrilling observations and many new (local) birds to be discovered.
