Flowers, animals signal spring arrived long ago

[DeepModem Mom]

Source: Reuters

Flowers, animals signal spring arrived long ago
By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent
Tue Mar 20

OSLO (Reuters) - Early flowers, migrating swallows and sleepless bears are among signs that spring has arrived long ago in the northern hemisphere even as a record mild winter formally ends on Tuesday with a rare chill.

Spring officially starts on Wednesday at 0007 GMT when the sun passes north over the celestial equator but scientists say the biological clocks of animals and plants are running ahead of time, perhaps upset by global warming.

Orange trees, olives and peaches are blooming weeks ahead of schedule in Greece, geese are cutting down on migrations in Canada and the United States and bears have been unable to hibernate in Bulgaria.

Red Admiral butterflies and swallows -- usually a sign of summer after the birds spend the winter in Africa -- have been spotted early in the Netherlands after the warmest Dutch autumn and winter since records starting in 1706.

"Springs have been getting earlier for the past 60 years. Plants have been getting incredibly confused, and birds have also been confused to some extent," said Andre Farrar of Britain's Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.

Winter in the northern hemisphere was the warmest since global records began in the late 19th century, spurred by a warming trend of recent decades and an El Nino warming of the Pacific, according to the U.S. government's weather agency....

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070320/ts_nm/spring_dc_1

[whistle]

1. Happy spring equinox Wednesday March 21, 2007 12:07am UTC

Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is a high-precision atomic time standard. UTC has uniform seconds defined by International Atomic Time (TAI), with leap seconds announced at irregular intervals to compensate for the earth's slowing rotation and other discrepancies. Leap seconds allow UTC to closely track Universal Time (UT), a time standard based not on the uniform passage of seconds, but on Earth's angular rotation.

Time zones around the world are expressed as positive or negative offsets from UTC. As the zero-point reference, UTC is also referred to as Zulu time (Z). UTC is often referred to as Greenwich Mean Time when describing time zones, although strictly speaking, it is only an approximation.

Example: Wednesday, 2007-03-21 T 06:49 UTC

[DeepModem Mom]

2. Thanks, whistle! nt

[idgiehkt]

11. thanks!

:toast:

[kineneb]

13. and Happy Norooz- Persian New Year- 2566

Mom called me yesterday afternoon to wish me a Happy New Year. My parents and all the Persian ex-pats always have big parties for the New Year.


From:
http://www.norooz.ca/

Norooz, Persian New Year
Year of 2566 (1386)
In harmony with rebirth of nature, the Persian New Year Celebration, or Norooz, always begins on the first day of spring, March 20th of each year. Norooz ceremonies are symbolic representations of two ancient concepts - the End and Rebirth. About 3000 years ago Persian's major religion was Zoroastrianism, named in honor of its founder Zoroaster, and arguably the world's first monotheistic religion. Zoroastrians had a festival called "Farvardgan" which lasted ten days, and took place at the end of the solar year. It appears that this was a festival of sorrow and mourning , signifying the end of life while the festival of Norooz, at the beginning of spring signified rebirth, and was a time of great joy and celebration. Norooz was officially acknowledged and named "Norooz" by mythical Persian emperor, Shah Jamshid, from Achaemenid Dynasty (500 BC). Ashaemenied created the first major empire in the region and built Persepolis complex (Takhte Jamshid) in the city of Shiraz. Norooz in Persian means "New Day" and brings hope, peace and prosperity to the world and has been celebrated among people regardless of ethnic background, political views or religion in many countries around the globe such as Iran, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Turkey, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Georgia, Iraq, Tajikistan, Syria ,Armenia and India. Some of the activities during Norooz are Spring cleaning, buying new cloths, painting eggs, family reunion, giving presents, visiting neighbors and friends and celebrating by having a picnic on the 13th day of Spring. Happy Norooz!

[Parisle]

3. The last couple of seasons have been hell on gardeners

--- At least on those of us who are trying to grow a backyard crop of cool season snow peas,... before the real "tomato-growing" weather sets in. The peas never make it,.. the heat comes on too fast. Can't seem to plant 'em early enough. Fifteen years ago, I could plant 70-day snow pea varieties in mid- to late March and they did just great. This year, I had a 60-day variety in the ground by the last week of February, and I still have my doubts. The trend is unmistakeable.

[heatstreak]

14. You ain't kiddin'. I know exactly what you mean.

[heatstreak]

4. Stupid, right-wing politicos will always argue otherwise. They will lose in the end.

[xchrom]

5. bay area here -- we have only had about 60% of our rain -- but

we had some of the COLDEST weather i've ever seen here.

i didn't think it could get that cold here, truth tell.

anyway -- here it is march and l.a. has already had a bad burn and spring is in full swing here.

[TechBear_Seattle]

6. I've been seeing robins in Seattle since early February

And the crocus started blooming in January. Spring definitely arrived early in my part of the U.S.

[qwlauren35]

7. Yes, the plants are getting confused.

I still won't change my closet over until late April. My husband has the spring bug, but I have no faith that the cold snaps are over, and we're in Maryland.

Our bulbs have put out leaves. I hope they are very hearty.

Even though it seems our winters are "mild", to me, the weather just seems freakish and unpredictable.

[LibDemAlways]

8. Dogwood trees that never bloom in my neighborhood

until April bloomed in January this year. Nature is, indeed, confused.

[shanti]

9. everything seems

to be about a month ahead of schedule here in sacramento...it doesn't feel right:(

[slackmaster]

10. We just got a little spring rain in San Diego

Not unusual for March, but my daffodils did bloom about a month early, and my Bletillas (Asian terrestrial orchids) which normally bloom in late April have buds on them now.

The Bletillas are growing in the ground outdoors BTW. I figured out their secret: They like rocks.

I planted about 200 garlic plants in January. They're growing like gangbusters.

[UnyieldingHierophant]

12. Doomed, doomed I tell ya'*

FTF