Early Signs of Spring

1. Horses are shedding like mad.
2. The mare I ride is crabby, but a LOT less so than last year, Image is growing up at last!
3. The Robins have been back for a couple of weeks.
4. The black birds are back. The Starlings came a week ago, The Grackles and Red Wing Black Birds yesterday.
5. A pile of black stuff on the corner by the old gas station that looks like a new delivery of top soil. I would believe it if I didn't know better.
6. Lots of soft bird "twitters" - songs of small birds that I do not bother to identify. Some are surely House Finches and Gold Finches and various sparrows.
7. The male Cardinals whistling their territorial fences into place.
8. Mud under foot, over a layer of frost still in the soil.
9. Swiss cheese pot holes in the dirt road between our driveway and the pavement.
10. The same soft spot in our driveway that appears every spring as the frost goes out.
11. The sun is back for more than one day at a stretch.
12. Frost on the Silver Dog House in the morning.
13. Maple Syrup boiling in the pans.
14. The breezes feel softer.