May 5th
The 125th Day of the Year
Wide are the meadows of night,
And daisies are shining there,
Tossing their lovely dews,
Lustrous and fair….
Walter de la Mare
Sunrise/set: 5:31/7:33
Day’s Length: 14 hours 2 minutes
Average High/Low: 69/48
Average Temperature: 58
Record High: 90 – 1952
Record Low: 30 – 1907
Weather
May 5 is generally a pleasant day, with a 25 percent chance of a high in the 80s, another 25 percent of 70s, and 50 percent of 60s. Rain falls one year in three; skies are partly to mostly sunny six years in ten; frost occurs ten to 15 percent of the mornings.
Natural Calendar
The season of Late Spring deepens when daddy longlegs begin hunting in the undergrowth and darners are out in the swamps. Cliff swallows migrate as buckeyes and lilacs and garlic mustard come into full bloom. Yellow wood sorrel blossoms in the yard, daisies in the garden, and the first cycle of cabbage white butterflies is often at its peak.
Most dandelions have gone to seed by the time daddy longlegs emerge. Ruby-throated hummingbirds arrive at your feeders then, and golden seal and Solomon’s seal come into bloom in the deep woods. There are buds on the black raspberries, mock orange, and mulberries. Sedum opens beside the fading large-flowered trilliums.
The first wave of goslings has emerged from its eggs by this time of the year. The thrush, catbird, and scarlet tanager arrive when wild cucumber sprouts by the rivers and nettles grow past knee high. Oak leaves are the size of a squirrel’s ear. Some maples are fully leafed, and some are dropping seeds. All across the country, the high tree line is completely alive either with new glowing foliage or orange buds or golden flowers.
Daybook
1982: The leaf canopy is filling quickly. On the cliffs of the Gorge, columbine is ready to open. Some of middle spring’s bluebells, spring beauties, toothwort, and cowslip hold on, but most of the flowers in the woods now belong to Late Spring: Solomon’s seal, false Solomon’s seal, bellwort, wild phlox, wild geraniums, golden alexander, wood betony, early meadow rue, swamp buttercups, ginger, Jacob’s ladder, golden seal (seen for the first time).
1983: Rose of Sharon begins to leaf out, also mock orange. Poppies seen in the village. First fleabane in the yard.
1984: First lily-of-the-valley seen in town
1986: Redbud getting leaves. Scarlet pimpernel just opening below its branches. Clustered snakeroot season starting. First sweet rockets flowering off Grinnell. Larkspur in the middle of its season. Late maples finally leafing. Snowball viburnum full. Dayflower leaves emerged from the ground today.
1987: Grape leaves half size. Hackberry leaves are emerging. The first daisy opened all the way today.
1988: Horseradish flowering. First daisy barely starting to unravel. Osage and rose of Sharon are starting to leaf, oak line still not green. Poplars now fully leafed. Last of the late maples leafing. At Sycamore Hole, two shiners caught, their flanks red, head covered with sharp “horns.” Star of Bethlehem bloomed today. Crab apple petals coming down now. Redbud still purple, trillium grandiflorum still full.
1989: Magnificent dominance of garlic mustard in the woods, tall and dense, lush despite last summer’s drought; the seeds did better than ever.
1990: Iris have developed buds in the last few days.
1992: Astilbe budding, as well as daisies and pyrethrums. Pink quince full bloom for about three days. Honeysuckle full bloom. First red admiral butterfly seen. Cowslip done for the year.
1993: Ferns have almost reached their full height since the first of the month, and many have opened now, fresh green fronds still curled at the tip. Hosta leaves have unraveled in the east garden. Lupines are budding in the north garden. Most of the cherry petals have fallen. Most of the cowslip is gone. Dayflower foliage is up.
1995: At Jacoby, the fat yellow cowslip is in full bloom among the giant skunk cabbage. Tall white spring cress grows by the brook, golden ragwort beside it, violet wild phlox scattered along the swamp. The slopes are filled with garlic mustard, solid fields of green and white among the still bare trees. Closer to the water, chickweed is tall and spindly, still flowering. A wild cucumber found sprouting near one of the springs. By the road, buckeyes are in full bloom, sweet rockets budding and up to my waist. The first red azalea opened in the east garden this afternoon.
1998: Honeysuckle around the yard is opening now. Full bright yellow cressleaf groundsel throughout the fields. Still full bloom of dogwood and midseason for bridal wreath spirea. First wild strawberries flower in the lawn.
2000: First mock orange flower, first pyrethrum unravels all the way. Full bloom of thyme and horseradish. Red tree peony seen open yesterday. Full blooming hawthorn seen in Dayton, petals falling in the hot breeze. Dogwoods still full, azaleas still full but starting to fade. Flax full bloom, along with the blue and white wood hyacinths and the golden ranunculus. Bamboo has sent up five new shoots, now three feet long. Thirteen leaves on the water lily in the pond. Across the fields, winter cress paling, getting old.
2001: Early full honeysuckle and sweet rocket time along the path. Korean lilac opens at the northwest corner of the house.
2003: A red admiral visited the north garden this morning.
2006: At South Glen, garlic mustard was tall and late, sweet Cicely, ragwort, water cress and wild geraniums full, honeysuckle early full, silver olive full and fragrant, purple waterleaf and sweet rockets starting, May apples fully budded, one fading trillium grandiflorum, one question mark butterfly warming itself on the leaf of a leafcup plant. In the alley, the white lilac has rusted. When I walked Bella again this evening, the purple lilacs were in decline. In the yard, the Korean lilac was opening and the first mock orange had pushed out.
2007: Rachel’s ginkgo is just starting to come in (for the second time, thanks to the late freeze). Mateo’s Jerusalem artichokes are about a foot tall. The alley willow tree is leafing again, but the foliage is spotty. Some poison ivy leaves fully developed. Blue wood hyacinths continue at their best. Hackberry leaves about a third of their full size. Flax seen north on the highway. Indigo bunting reported by Jayne, most likely in the same migratory group as the one we saw yesterday.
2008: South Glen: Geese still defending their territory. Wood thrush, red-bellied woodpecker and Baltimore oriole heard. Mike also heard several kinds of warblers. The woods has filled with white blooming garlic mustard and white violets. Beneath them, the deep red wild ginger and aging toad trilliums. Touch-me-nots have six to eight leaves. One silver olive bush on the way to the butterfly preserve is full of blossoms. The wild black raspberries are just starting to bud. One blue robin’s egg shell found on the path along the river.
In the yard, the late tulips are still very much intact, the lilacs still fragrant. Cressleaf groundsel fully open by the roadside and in the yard. Jeanie and I saw a blue-bodied dragonfly in the circle garden at noon. More coleus planted in the east garden and the bird bath garden, Jerusalem artichokes transplanted to the bedroom window area this evening. Ruby Nicholson called to say that “there was a carpet of white violets” at Tar Hollow in eastern Ohio.
2009: First sweet rocket opened in the yard this morning. Ramps yellowed under the mock orange. The first few yellow ranunculus have opened by the east side of the house. Artichokes are up to a foot tall. Late tulips holding. Honeysuckles almost blooming, like the hawthorns in the park. Toad sings about 3:00 p.m. and sang yesterday, too. Robins at sundown, but no grackles then.
2010: Yellow tiger swallowtail in the yard this morning. Standard lilacs disappearing, Korean lilac still holds full, tulips completely gone. Firefly found while working on the foundation for the new shed. Bean leaf beetles have attacked the heliopsis. The cats killed a young bird, probably a sparrow or finch, the first one they have brought home since we started to let them out.
2011: Greg’s lily-of-the-valley patch is in early bloom. Rachel’s ginkgo leaves are just about full size. A few lilacs are rusting, and bridal wreath is very close to opening, tight white buds straining. Snowball viburnums are open or opening in the yard and into Dayton. The latest tulips hold on in the north garden. One patch of the new red Appledorns is gone, the other still keeping its petals. As I walked Bella this morning before 9:00, song sparrows, house sparrows, robins and cardinals were singing, but no grackles called. In the evening, only robins heard, quieter. When we went to bed, a large black fly kept buzzing around the lamp, a little earlier than last year.
2012: The red-bellied woodpecker continues to call insistently each day. Oakleaf hydrangeas, Annabelle hydrangea, hobble bush hydrangea all are fully budded. White mulberries are completely formed. More knockout roses, spiderworts and sweet rockets come into bloom, bringing color to the side yard gardens. At the south end of High Street, a wild cherry tree is loaded with blossoms.
2013: Walk before dawn with Bella: the sky turquoise and bright pink-orange, the town traffic quiet on this Sunday morning, the doves, cardinals, robins, wrens and song sparrows filling up all the space of the neighborhood. Along Dayton Street in the twilight, I saw what looked like a starling or a robin flapping its wings as though it had been struck by a car and was in its death throes. As I approached, however, death turned to lust as the flopping creature became two mating birds, saw me and chased each other up into the serviceberry in front of Gerard and Helen’s house. Late in the morning, the red-bellied woodpecker called; I had been missing him. Petal fall has begun in the park and in the yard, even as the flowers reach their best.
Rick came over around noon, excited to find tiny praying mantises emerging out from their nest-like “ootheca.” They were maybe a fourth to three-eights of an inch long and were scrambling out of their winter habitat. He had discovered their sack on the branch of a Bradford pear tree he had cut down, so it is likely, phenologically speaking, that praying mantises typically hatch when pear trees leaf out just after they lose their petals, at the start of Late Spring. And the female laid her eggs five to six months earlier in last year’s warm November or December, just before the pear leaves came down.
Later Kathryn called: She had seen two Baltimore Orioles feeding in her maple tree, some of the very first to arrive in southwestern Ohio. All of which puts praying mantis emergence in sync with the arrival of hummingbirds (yesterday’s news from Casey) with the arrival of Baltimore orioles and the end of dandelion bloom and the falling of apple petals.
And at Ellis Pond, pawpaw flowers are soft and dark red like wild ginger. Mountain ash has umbels open, the buckeyes and sassafras are in bloom, and the red horse chestnut tree is budded. The sawtooth oak is draped with golden three-inch catkins. And so many of the other trees are leafing, the canopy filling quickly.
2014: In the alley, the bittersweet has leaves almost an inch long. At the edge of the north garden, the tree of heaven has put out nubby branch growth. Also in the north garden, the blue wood hyacinths have started to bloom. At Ellis Pond, late full dandelions, tulip tree leaves about two inches, bur oak and white oak and black oak all with leaves about half an inch to an inch long, scarlet oaks more developed, chestnut oak in flower.
2015: Morning walk into North Glen with Chris: Wild phlox, golden Alexander, wood betony (in full bloom covering an entire hillock), May apples, sweet Cicely, spring beauty, wild ginger, very late trillium grandiflorum, first catchweed, white violets, one nodding trillium, swamp buttercups, small anemone, miterwort, garlic mustard. In the back yard, grackles through the day, and small female house finches, up to four at one time, at the feeder. A female Baltimore oriole came for black sunflower seeds. At John Bryan Park: ragwort common in the woods, thyme-leafed speedwell in the grass, silver olive shrubs full bloom along the roads.
2017: Spoleto, Italy: Walk in the hills toward Campello: Cottonwood cotton piling up in the shallow gutters of the streets, locusts and buckeye-like trees in full bloom. Bladderworts, buttercups, ginestra and sow thistles very common, and a few giant thistles with variegated leaves were budding. Corn was sprouting in the fields, one field of winter grain turning.
2018: Keuka Lake to Ithaca, NY: The hour drive past Seneca Lake into a valley brought full blooming dandelions (and even many to seed) as well as many beds of tulips in the city. From Spoleto, Neysa sends a photo of tiny golden spiders hatching on a sunny green leaf. Tat reports hearing sandhill cranes flying overhead in Madison, Wisconsin.
2019: To Cincinnati with Jill: Sun and mild, the tree line mostly green in many areas. Honeysuckles were opening, cattail foliage was full size, wild cherry trees and silver olive shrubs were in bloom. At Ellis Pond, I found that the wild strawberries had produced their yellow blossoms and that fleabane had grown tall and flowered. In the fields, groundsel is still peaking, and now Canadian thistle foliage is past the top of my boot. At Jill’s, her burning bush is in bloom.
2020: Krista announced pawpaws in bloom. Mary Sue sent photos of Baltimore orioles and red-breasted grosbeaks eating oranges at her feeder! From Goshen, Indiana, my sister Judy wrote: “We have goslings! Two plump, fluffy little babies were waddled out by their proud parents this morning. Fewer than usual, but bigger – or else they’ve been kept hidden a little longer.”
Any landscape is composed not only of what lies before our eyes but what lies within our hearts.
D. W. Meinig