SOME THOUGHTS ON THE ADVENT OF SPRING IN BAYFIELD

ANOTHER CHILL, GRAY DAY

Saturday, 9:00 AM. 36 degrees F, wind NE, blustery.  The sky has a high overcast and clouds but looks like it might become partly cloudy or even clear.  The humidity is 77% and the barometer is more-or-less steady, now standing at 30.02".  The brisk wind out of the NE will render the day pretty chilly.
   Yesterday's trip to Northwoods Nursery in Rhinelander, Wisconsin was entirely uneventful.  Rhinelander is 150 miles diagonally southeast of Bayfield, on the upper Wisconsin River.  We got there about 1:00 PM, loaded up our pots of dormant native grasses, and got back to Bayfield with time to unload them at the job site.
   We looked in vain for real  signs of spring in northern Wisconsin and saw none overt enough to be seen from a moving vehicle, save for the fact that there is no longer ice on the lakes.  In fact, there are more obvious signs of spring, such as early blooming garden plants, in Bayfield than any of the small communities we drove through on the way there and back.  I think it is safe to say that Bayfield, on the shores of Lake Superior, is closer to real spring than any of the territory south and east that we traversed. This seems counterintuitive, but Bayfield, on the shores of the big lake, is a full climate zone warmer than many regions further south.  Given that day length is one of the major factors in plants breaking dormancy, the temperature and light factors may cancel each other out and spring may get to all of us more or less at the same time.  It is hard to come to any definite conclusions regarding this, as every season is somewhat different as far as spring temperatures are concerned.  The day length factor of course is a constant.
   At Northwoods, which is a large wholesale nursery, things are just starting to get busy with still-dormant plants just now being picked up by customers.  They will be very busy shipping in a week or two but as for now the business itself is still breaking out of dormancy, so to speak.  Everything in the nursery business is compressed into a few short periods of frenetic activity in the spring and again in the fall with digging, loading and delivering plants to customers.  Growing plants in pots has of course extended the seasons immensely for northern growers, but it is all still a huge challenge.
   So why bother to propagate and grow plants this far north? Mainly, to be able to sell tried and proven winter hardy plants and to be closer to regional northern markets.   I, for one, know these plants will grow where I plant them (plant hardiness is a complicated subject, but the basic advantages of being propagated and grown in the localities plants are to be planted in are still valid).
   To render the trip even more wintery, we saw no wildlife while driving; no deer, no turkeys, no eagles, etc.  Perhaps that was a result not only of still wintry weather with temperatures in the thirties or a bit higher, but also the fact that there was a lot of traffic on the road, the only reason I can think of, that being a Friday, a lot of winter-weary folks are coming north on the weekend to open their cottages for the coming season.
   Lots of luck.

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