May 3rd 
The 123rd Day of the Year
Rise early now this month of Maye,
And walk the fields that be so gaye.
Buckminster Almanack, May 1598
Sunrise/set: 5:33/7:31
Day’s Length: 13 hours 58 minutes
Average High/Low: 68/47
Average Temperature: 57
Record High: 90 – 1899
Record Low: 33 – 1970
Weather
Today is the May day most likely to register a high only in the 50s: forty percent of May 3rds are typically that cold. Another 40 percent are only in the 60s; fifteen percent are in the 70s, five percent in the 80s. Rain comes one day in three, completely overcast conditions four days in ten. Frost strikes ten to fifteen percent of the mornings.
Natural Calendar
Soil temperatures average in the high 50s by today all along the 40th Parallel. The oats crop is typically all sown, and winter wheat is two feet high. A third of the corn, sugar beets, and potatoes has been planted in typical years. Most of the tobacco beds have sprouted. Asparagus peaks at roadside markets. Weevils build up in alfalfa. Bagworms and powdery mildew attack the wheat. The first June bug (brown Phylophaga) appears at your screen door.
The last of the region’s livestock moves to pasture. Along the freeways, daisies, yellow sweet clover, blue flax, meadow goat’s beard, garlic mustard, sweet rockets and parsnips flower. Meadows host white clover and red clover, tall meadow rue, catchweed, sweet rocket, fire pink and angelica. Blackberries, black raspberries, multiflora roses and elderberry bushes bloom in the hedgerows. Mock orange, locusts, wild cherry trees, yellow poplars (tulip trees), Kousa dogwoods and peonies join the early iris, sweet Williams, climbing roses and rhododendrons.
In the deep woods, late Jack-in-the-pulpit, nodding trillium, Solomon’s seal, columbine, waterleaf, shooting star, and clustered snakeroot bloom. The leaves of the understory reach full size, and the high canopy starts to fill in above it. Redbuds, crab apples and dogwoods cede to honeysuckles and azaleas and rhododendrons. In most years, the great dandelion bloom has ended in the Lower Midwest and Mid-Atlantic region, still holds in the Northeast and the Upper Midwest.
Daybook
1982: Leaves have started on the rose of Sharon.
1984: This is the best time of the violets, spring beauties and dandelions. Lilac open, pink magnolias still full bloom.
1985: Red clover and black medic are in bloom. New daddy longlegs crouch in the fresh wingstem foliage. Some touch-me-nots have six leaves, some eight. Goat’s beard is budding. Violets holding. Wood nettle paces the wood mint, up to two feet high. Geraniums, sedum, tall buttercups, ragwort, Jacob’s ladder, water cress, fleabane, spring cress, sweet rocket, catchweed, sweet Cicely all full bloom. Small flowered buttercup coming to the end, its seed burs forming. First green flower on the clustered snake root. Knotweed five feet high. Garlic mustard, late bloom, dominates the woods. Bobwhite calling. First mosquito seen.
1986: First wild strawberry flower noticed today.
1989: Buds well formed on the poppies. Poplar full-leafed now. Tree line a pale green, patchy but predominantly turning. First common fleabane flowers. Knotweed chin high. Hops six to eight feet into the honeysuckles behind the north garden. Horseradish heading up. Sugar maple leaves half size. The white mulberry tree is blooming at the northwest corner of the yard.
1991: Cascades in Glen Helen: Last of the large-flowered trillium in bloom, pink with age, Solomon’s plume fresh, full. Some anemone hold. The ground cover belongs completely to Late Spring, garlic mustard towering over the other growth. In town, some iris have been out since the first of May. First orange poppy opened today in the south garden; other yards have many open. Watercress full bloom along Grinnell Road going down towards the river. Horseradish and comfrey early full in the yard.
1993: Brome grass completely formed on the north side of the newspaper office. At school, ginkgo leaves have grown to maybe an inch wide in the past four days. Sweet gum is in flower. Clumps of shepherd’s purse have gone to seed. A last magnolia flower holds on the north side of my office building. At home, tulips still full bloom, almost all forsythia flowers fallen, at least half the leafing done. Apple tree full bloom.
1995: The cold spring continues, keeping all the redbuds and dogwoods in middle spring. Tulips are getting old now, but they are also kept in color by the weather. The silver maples have leaves maybe a fourth of their normal size now, and the reds are starting to get their leaves. Quince is still in bloom about town. The late daffodils are still strong in the south garden. Japanese knotweed is almost six feet tall now, dock and burdock lush. Along Grinnell Road, the last of the clump of cowslip flowers weakens, but golden ragwort replaces it. At Grinnell Pond just a little down from the bike path, the woods floor fills in with garlic mustard and violets, middle spring swallowed up. Red columbines hang from the cliffs and rocks.
1998: The Osage are starting to leaf now. Hollyhock stalks are four feet tall. First radishes pulled from the garden yesterday.
2000: To Caesar Creek: Sunny, cool, water and barometer high, northeast wind. Few bites all day; caught one fresh-water drum, silver with a triangular shape. The tree line was greening all along the shore, seemed ahead of the countryside. Bird watching better than fishing: a pair of orioles seen; and my catfish spot had few catfish, but it did have a pair of Prothonotary warblers flying back and forth to their hole in a dead tree. Geese were paired and loud all around me, honking and bobbing and swimming back and forth. Upstream, one pair had three goslings which were the size of my shoe, had been born maybe April 20? Carp were rooting, splashing, frolicking. Flickers and jays and bullfrogs and an occasional toad were calling, swallows swooping. Three yellow tiger swallowtails seen. The river was full of golden winter cress and cressleaf groundsel in full bloom. A buckeye tree still showed flowers at the water’s edge. Sycamore leaves: about an inch, elms an inch, cottonwoods and maples maybe half size, Virginia creeper maybe a fourth to a third size.
2001: Ticks and mosquitoes all around at Conrad’s estate. Sweet Cicely in full bloom there, along with a large patch of Jack-in-the-pulpit. Very late pink large-flowered trillium. Black snakeroot taking shape. The goose at Conrad’s pond had hatched a gosling recently, and wood ducks were nesting. One wild cherry tree was in bloom, another getting ready. At Susi’s, the white anemones started to open today.
2003: At 3:45 this morning, only faint twittering from the robins. By four, they were clearly awake. Very first Korean lilac flower opened today. Lily-of-the-valley is still in full bloom on Dayton Street. First purple iris noticed blossoming. Most of the maples, pears, apples, peach trees have filled in around town. Cottonwoods are half green, and the city canopy is close to looking like summer, a rapid and radical transformation in less than a month.
2004: Now all the red tulips under the new red crabapple are disintegrating as the wood hyacinths on the west side of the house reach full bloom.
2005: Lily-of-the-valley is blooming now.
2006: A cardinal sang outside the back door at 5:01 this morning. Some black walnut trees in town are just starting to leaf, pacing the tree of heaven, both varieties still bare among the closing canopy. One black walnut near Casey’s, though, is flowering. Silver maples are dropping their giant, winged seedpods. First question mark butterfly of the year seen this afternoon. It came by and landed near me as I was laying bricks for the patio.
2007: First honeysuckle blooms in the alley and in the yard. One violet iris and one sweet rocket seen flowering as I rode back from downtown. Wood hyacinths and lily-of-the-valley full now. The new anemone has blossomed in the apple-tree garden.
2008: Don’s pie cherry has set fruit at the same time as the service berries. One purple anemone is open in the apple-tree/circle garden. The first chives are flowering. Silver maples have huge green seed wings, some dropping in the rain. The red maple at the park has reddish seeds. Tomatoes and red onions planted in the north beds. Very first purple hyacinth opened by afternoon. Greg’s lily-of-the-valleys are coming in now.
2009: The Korean lilac is starting now in the yard, and the two hawthorn trees at the park are ready to come in. One flower bud is open.
2010: The weekend’s rain has made the Korean lilac (in full bloom) lean as though it had been pulled up at its roots. In the alley, bridal wreath, honeysuckles, snowball viburnum, white violets, geraniums in full bloom. White and red mulberry fruit is almost fully formed, but still green and bristly. Multiflora roses budded, box elder trees with seeds. Suddenly early fleabane. In the dooryard garden, the pink azalea continues strong and beautiful. This afternoon, the first skipper flew by the back porch. Locust trees were in bloom all the way to Beavercreek.
2011: Rain and cool continues. Flooding throughout the Ohio and Mississippi valleys. A few alliums open in Liz’s front yard.
2012: Close to record heat today, high in the upper 80s. Robins were singing when I went outside this morning at 4:40, and I heard the first cardinal ten minutes later. Honeysuckle, viburnum, Korean lilac and azalea flowers fall heavily now. Knockout roses seen in full bloom throughout Dayton. Fritillary in the circle garden at noon. Locusts and wood hyacinths still strong throughout town and the countryside. Indian hyacinths done for the year, the wood hyacinths starting to discolor. The transition period ahead, past wood hyacinths, should be filled with perennial salvia, blue flags, standard iris, sweet Williams, sweet rocket, clematis, knockout roses, catmint. The phase before that, the phase of the wood hyacinths, includes bleeding hearts, standard lilac, the Korean lilac, and the azalea.
Two fish, Flash (bright gold) and Bubba (white and orange), placed in the water garden, one hardy water lily and ten water hyacinths, too. Dahlias planted south of the porch. From Goshen Indiana, 200 miles northwest of Yellow Springs, Judy writes: “Saw two plants: Dame’s rocket and ox-eye daisy that are growing on the banks of our pond out back, along with fading wild ginger and striped white violet, small-flower crowfoot, fringed Phaecilia, Solomon’s plume, celandine, bristly gooseberry, star of Bethlehem, clustered snakeroot, white spring cress, false rue anemone and common fleabane, along with blue phlox. Just a few large trilliums left there, and a few toad trilliums, but going fast.”
2013: First star of Bethlehem opened in the yard, and the trumpet vine is leafing. Liz has two alliums in bloom this morning, her forget-me-nots are very blue, and her poppies have budded. Bridal wreath spirea just starting downtown. From Goshen, Judy reports that the koi in the pond by her condominium are frolicking and splashing around and that goslings have been out for a week or two.
Into the North Glen with Bella: May apples and Solomon’s plume with buds, spring beauties and bluebells, the last of the middle spring wildflowers, fresh poison ivy leaves all shiny, leafcup two feet high, nodding trillium, aging pink large-flowered trillium, one last lesser celandine, wild geranium, wood betony, sweet Cicely, Jack-in-the-pulpit, miterwort, meadow rue, bellwort, columbine, sedum, ragwort, small flowered buttercup, catchweed blooming, bloodroot leaves swollen to two or three times the size they were when their blossoms were out. Spicebush leaves were one to two inches long, tinged with red. Skunk cabbage leaves were fully developed, massive, completely covering their wetland.
2014: Poppies budded in the alley. Rose of Sharon, buds having broken a week ago, are slowly leafing, maybe an eighth of an inch. Bluebells getting floppy. Lilacs late, but still very full around the neighborhood. So many violets in the lawns, many of them very pale lavender. The tallest new bamboo stalk is about eight feet tall. The pink quince has come into full bloom. Lori Young from Springfield sent photos of a family of foxes that shows them nursing and playing between May 3 and 9. The size of the pups would indicate that they were born in early April or late March.
2015: Out at 4:20 this morning to run: robins in early full song when I left, cardinals holding off until 4:40, a wren chattering and Rick’s American toads calling when I came down Wright Street at 4:50, doves at 4:55 and a blue jay sharp and strong at 5:00. While I was working at the shop today, Jeanie’s Indian hyacinths came into bloom in the circle garden, joining the one white wood hyacinth. The green flowers of the viburnum by the north side of the house are turning white; the azalea buds are fat and red, but they haven’t opened yet. The red crab apple flowers still hold above them. More zinnias planted today, no sprouting of previous plantings yet.
2016: Sweet rockets opened on the west side of Jill’s outbuilding, probably at the same moment as two of her orange poppies bloomed on the south side. Low white sedum and nodding waterleaf fully open along the bike path.
2017: Arriving in Rome from Barcelona and then riding to Spoleto with Tat to see Neysa and Ivano: locusts seen open along the roadsides (placing the season at about the same point as that of Santiago in Spain), elderberry bushes in flower, hills deep green, hay fields all cut and some hay baled, ginestra blooming. At Neysa’s house, small red cyclamen-like flowers scattered among the trees.
2018: Departing for Keuka Lake in western New York with Jill: Allium and Indian hyacinths in the circle garden budded, bamboo sprouts up to three feet. A few poppies and full-blooming forget-me-nots at Liz’s house. The tree line is filling with green. The apples are in bloom. In the dooryard garden, the wild geraniums are budding. As we drove north, we travelled parallel to the Great Dandelion Bloom until we reached the long road west in New York. Then the dandelions slowly thinned, and we left the time of flowering apples and redbuds and entered full daffodil, weeping cherry, star magnolia, pink magnolia, forsythia time and shedding maple time, early April in a normal year and easily three weeks behind the conditions in Yellow Springs.
2019: Pink quince petals starting to fall now. Heavy rain has flooded the porch and the yard – but a few tithonia seeds have survived to sprout, and milkweed stalks are rising now, some four inches. In the south garden area, the bamboo is finally finding its stride, some stalks four feet. One purple allium open, and one Indian hyacinth. One salsify bud at Ellis.
2020: Last night’s half inch of rain brought down almost all of Don’s wild cherry blossoms, and petalfall is underway for the crab apples. The hyacinths in the circle garden are almost blooming, the state of the year much like that of last year and the year before. Rick reports frogs all over his pond and yard. Christina’s pale violet iris are flowering along her south wall. A garden of dark purple sweet rocket is in full bloom near the back entrance to the Catholic cemetery. The fields beyond Ellis Pond are golden with groundsel all the way to the tree line. On the way from our walk, Jill and I saw thyme-leafed speedwell blossoming by the street, and tall blue speedwell in a lawn. Peggy’s Korean lilac bushes are still blooming, still very fragrant.
And some of us stayed there forever
With the rambler rose, the lilac,
The blue keen wind.
John Knoepfle