How I Know It's Spring - Mallards, Bats and Golf

I know Spring is near when the skunks come out to mate in February, when the mallards are still in large groups. Then the warm days emerge in March, the pairing off of the ducks and geese, finding them staking out their secluded spots in lagoons and inlets along the Lehigh Canal. The itch of my sons, hitting golf balls all winter, devolves into an itch I too must scratch. The Pennycress and dandelion spread across a blanket of greening grass.

But look closely as the bat's dark arms are visible with dusk's light as he tilts to swoop down.

The bright burning yellow of the forsythia, our first flowering bush, erupts. The dull red of the silver maple new twiggy growth with its red blossoms, our first flowering tree, emerges. And lately, I’ve noticed the bats enjoying an early meal of bugs along the mucky mud basins along the weigh lock section of the canal.

I watched this one for close to one half hour. He flew his consistent figure eight over this small pool of a puddle long enough for me to crawl under his path, to lie on my back and shoot these shots above me. He didn’t seem to care about my presence until I tried to get up. Then his swoops came close and closer to me, pinning me down, with his dips and weaves. These flying mammals hold so much mystery and mystique with me.

But there are new old things to see, with the warm weather and lack of foliage, I can get inside this old water spillway leading from the Lehigh Canal just above the Weigh Lock below Jim Thorpe.