Springing Forward

In my article for the April issue of the Tetbury Advertiser, I ponder the different definitions of Spring.

After the wettest winter that I can remember, I’ve been looking forward more than ever to the spring.

January and February are in any case my least favourite months, so I’m always glad when 1st March comes around. But this year, I’m particularly pleased because I’ve just discovered that meteorologists count it as the first day of spring.

How did I not know that before? I’d always believed spring started at the equinox, halfway between winter and summer solstices, around 21st March. Now I learn that’s only in astronomical terms.

Date alone is of course no guarantee that it will start to feel like spring. There are more reliable indicators.

I used to include the appearance of daffodils and lambs among them, but in recent years I’ve so often spotted them before Christmas that I’ve crossed them off my list.

When I kept chickens, their return to laying was a surer sign of spring, as it’s triggered by the increase in daylight hours.

Now the only animals in my household are cats. They have their own ideas about when spring starts, as cats do about most things. Mine must be optimists, because they’ve been shedding their winter coats since January, even though the weather continued to be cold enough to justify thermal vests (for me, not for them).

By the start of March, they were spending a lot more time out of doors, lured by birdsong and transfixed by numerous frogs playing hide-and-seek in the pond.

Although I lingered indoors in the warm, I kept a watchful eye on the garden from within. Through my study window, I spotted plum blossom on the otherwise bare branches. (Unlike apple trees, plums produce flowers before leaves).

From the French windows downstairs, I noticed a new red tulip appearing every day, then another, then another, until there was a neat row of them along one flowerbed like soldiers on parade.

Halfway down the garden I spied bright green leaves unfurling, the rhubarb emerging from subterranean hibernation.

Further evidence of spring arrived when the familiar chime heralded a visit from the ice-cream van, and I realised to my surprise it was no longer too cold to enjoy ice cream, tucking into my first 99 of the year.

I needed only one final proof of spring’s arrival: the start of British Summer Time. Checking my calendar, I discovered that this year, it falls on Easter Sunday. As a churchgoer, I found this double symbol of fresh starts and hopeful new beginnings especially pleasing.

It’s also distribution day for the April issue of the Tetbury Advertiser. What more could I wish for? Here’s to a bright and cheerful spring for us all.

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Spring Reading

If that little array of spring photos has put you in the mood for some spring reading, here’s a selection of seasonal books to choose from. All are available as ebooks and paperbacks to buy online and to order from bookshops, and the novels are also available as hardbacks and audiobooks.

Click here to order Springtime for Murder

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Click here to order The Clutch of Eggs

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Click here to order Artful Antics at St Bride’s

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Click here to order Mrs Morris Changes Lanes