The exuberance of June…began at daybreak with the chirping and chattering of birds close at hand and in widening circles around us. And then, what greater wonder than the rising of the Sun? Even the nights, as yet without insect choirs, were alive. Fireflies against the mass of trees were flashing galaxies which repeatedly made and unmade abstract patterns of light, voiceless as the stars overhead…. – Harlan Hubbard

The Moon: After reaching perigee (its position closest to Earth), the Strawberry Moon wanes until it enters its final quarter on June 10 at 3:32 p.m.

The Sun: The Sun is more than 95 percent of the way to summer solstice.

The Planets: Saturn is visible in the east before dawn. Jupiter, rising after Saturn, is the brightest Morning Star.

The Stars: At midnight, all the constellations that move along the horizon during the summer are visible: Capricorn in the southeast, Sagittarius and Scorpio in the south and Libra in the southwest.

Weather Trends: Between June 8 and 11, the average temperature rises just one degree in four days instead of late spring’s one degree in three. Then, between the 15th to the 19th, it climbs just one degree in five days, reaching its summer zenith.

The Natural Calendar: Fledglings continue to leave the nest throughout most of June. If you have a cat, keep him/her indoors. Try not to use chemical poisons on insects unless your livelihood depends on it: insect populations are declining throughout the world (although sometimes that’s hard to believe), and insecticides are often cumulative as well as invasive, affecting ground water and insect and bird populations far beyond the place in which they are used.

In the Field and Garden: The darkening moon is right for all kinds of animal care (especially worming and spraying for external parasites), for planting root crops, shrubs and trees, for weeding and mulching and insect hunting. Harvest canola, commercial broccoli and squash. Plant or transplant the last of the summer annuals: late zinnias, dahlias, black-eyed Susans, Mexican sunflowers, petunias and whatever else you have.

It is the high time for cucumber beetles in cucumbers, for powdery mildew on the phlox and for potato leafhoppers in the alfalfa. Chinch bugs hatch in the lawn. Whiteflies attack azaleas. Weevils assault the yellow poplars. Rose chafers and two-spotted spider mites appear on rose bushes. Leafminers work arborvitae, birch, locusts, boxwood, elms, holly and juniper. Eastern tent caterpillars leave their tents.

Inspired by all the insects, weaving spiders weave the first major network of cobwebs across the woodland paths. Long-bodied orb weavers set their webs across ponds and streams. Wolf spiders and toads hunt the fields and forest floor. Birds feast and feed their young with the great Early Summer insect hatch.

Mind and Body: Strawberries, mulberries and black raspberries are becoming common in farmers markets now, along with bedding plants, herbs and cut flowers. Summer’s vibrant color and sweetness reach out to people as well as to birds and insects, feeding the spirit and the eye and palate. As the canopy of leaves closes overhead, a deeper sense of Early Summer may contribute to improved moods and attitudes. In almost every year, the corn has sprouted and is climbing toward your knees. The winter wheat is long and burnished with pale gold. The solstice is still over a week away, and it seems everything is still possible.

Countdown to Late Summer 

• One week until bee balm blooms and beckons all the bees

• Two weeks until cicadas chant in the hot and humid days

• Three weeks until thistles turn to down

• Four weeks until sycamore bark starts to fall, marking the center of Deep Summer

• Five weeks to the season of singing crickets and katydids after dark

• Six weeks until ragweed pollen floats in the wind 

• Seven weeks until blackberries are ready for jam and brandy

• Eight weeks until aster and goldenrod time

• Nine weeks until the season of fall apples begins

• 10 weeks until the corn harvest gets underway

Onslaught of the Pooping Grackles

I have a small koi pond with a waterfall in my yard. The fish are beautiful in their reds and golds and silvers and have become my pets. I clean out the pond filter every few weeks to keep algae under control. On May 29, I did the cleaning but was surprised the find that the waterfall was producing white foam as though someone had come by during the night and threw in some dish soap. And the fish were racing around the pond. Something was not right.

In a few days, the water cleared up, but I didn’t figure out what happened until I chanced upon my daybook entry of May 24, 2010. Rick had written to tell me that the grackles around his home were placing the fecal sacks of the newly hatched fledglings into his birdbath and pond.

“What started out last year as an occasional fecal sack in our birdbath (which can no longer be called such) has mushroomed into an onslaught, with there often being more than 50 popcorn-sized sacks by day’s end. Moreover, these grackles have lined the rocks around our pond with white sacks, and sometimes don’t even bother to land, bombarding the pond on their way over. One result, we surmise, is that our pond is getting too much nitrogen, why water from the waterfalls is frothing white. Something we haven’t seen before.”

By June 1, the crisis had passed: “Wouldn’t you know,” wrote Rick, “that right about the time I was about to give up, the problem solved itself. The babies, wherever they were, all must have fledged at once because the onslaught abruptly stopped.”

In my case this year, the waterfall stopped foaming after two days. Then came a four-day, Pentecost-like burst of grackles and their young feeding and begging and clucking and scrawing and whining and grackling and speaking in tongues that lasted from morning until night. Then all was quiet and the pond stayed clear and the fish calmed down and were happy.

The grackles perform the celebratory ritual of bringing out their fledglings all together in a feeding frenzy in my yard every year. Up until this May they spared my pond. Maybe they finally left Rick alone.

***

ANSWERS TO LAST WEEK’S SCKRAMBLER

OMOGNOWL MOONGLOW

TOUWORG OUTGROW

OOPNHC PONCHO

PMISRERASOI IMPRESSARIO

NABREDLILREO BANDERILLERO

OOKYT TOKYO

OOERRT TORERO

OOEDPRT TORPEDO

OOERTM TREMOLO

OEITTSL STILETO

UIODST STUDIO

THIS WEEK’S RHYMING SCKRAMBLER

EKOY   

PKEP   

EPKO   

HOCEK 

OPELVM

EKOVORP

KEOVE

EOWK

EKOC

TOKES

In order to estimate your SCKRAMBLER IQ, award yourself 15 points for each word unscrambled, adding a 50-point bonus for getting all of them correct. If you find a typo, add another 15 points to your IQ. Yes, you are a genius.

Follow the summer with Bill Felker’s A Daybook for June in Yellow Springs, Ohio, and A Daybook for July in Yellow Springs, Ohio. These daybooks are applicable to the entire Lower Midwest and contain all the nature notes used to create Poor Will’s Almanack. Order yours from Amazon. You can also purchase Bill Felker’s new book of essays, The Virgin Point, there.

Copyright 2023 – W. L. Felker