Over break, I was really excited to see how my phenology spot would change once it became spring so I was glad to get back to the spot three days after the official start of the season. Despite this, Vermont’s still been receiving snowfall in the early part of the season, allowing for this to be my last visit with any snow on the ground. The pond was still partly frozen over during this visit as well, making it so the only bird life I saw, geese, were able to comfortably stand on the pond.
Although a majority of plant life around the Sea Caves is yet to bud, I was able to find two types of trees that’ve started to bud. One of the trees that I saw started to bud was a yellow birch, which I saw had started to grow its buds farther from me in the sunlight. When I went down to the water, I found buds growing on a young red elderberry right next to the pond. It could be budding earlier than other plants because of the richer soil beneath the ground. The dry soil up above isn’t as good and hasn’t been able to support amphibian life so far in the spring.
