April 2022 - On & Off Earth
April is the annual host to the explosive, visible return of life to our northern end of Earth. It may start slowly with a splash of yellow here and there but our state flower and tree is about to change all that. Even as a late March chill fades, Dogwood blossoms are about to burst, filling forest and yards with their Spring display; and, yes, it is both our state flower and state tree and I think worthy of both.
As jonquils and forsythia, and soon dogwoods catch our eye’s low gaze, hiding far above our heads, also ready to burst, baby leaves, growing rapidly in April’s extra hour of daylight, will soon bathe our world in a lush green. Tiny, mallow poplar leaves lead the way along with maple leaves, red in youth but by April’s end the oak, gum and hickory will have joined in and the long views of winter will be gone, winter brown replaced by spring green.
As I was finishing up this month’s column I ran into a detour. A sudden confirmation of one of our universe’s basic forces and a quirky human question answered. Gravity is not just a good idea, it is the law and if a tree falls in the forest, it definitely does make a sound.
A huge oak tree, dead for years in my wooded front yard, pocked with holes drilled by woodpeckers, just crashed to the ground. I see new debris on trails every day, the remains from the January 3rd storm still hung up throughout the woods but to see and hear a huge tree crash down; impressive..and a little scary!
April sees the Big Dipper, the long tail and hindquarters of Ursa Major, the Great Bear, emerge from hibernation and rise, upside down for a dipper, high into the northeast sky after dark. The upper end’s pointer stars direct your eyes down to the Polaris, Earth’s current North Star.
Want to see Earth’s rotation in action? Check out the Big Dipper at 9pm and again at 10pm; the Dipper will have rotated about 12 degrees but the Pointers will still lead your eyes to Polaris, always parked due north, 38 degrees (our latitude) above the northern horizon.
The Full “Pink” moon is on the 16th. The sun, in Pisces since March 13th, moves into Aries on the April 20th. 45 minutes before sunrise(@ 6:31am) on the 18th, Jupiter, Venus, Mars and Saturn will be equally spaced in a line in the east-southeast; I might even get up early to check that out.
Got plans this weekend to visit our nation’s capital to see the cherry blossoms? You’ll want to wait until afternoon; Friday’s new moon will create high Spring (not the season) tides that will flood tidal basin walkways in the mornings; the semi-monthly brackish water incursion has already killed several cherry trees and forced pedestrian detours to be added.
With sea level rise in mind.. the 52nd celebration of Earth Day is Friday the 22nd. Since Apollo 8’s Earth Rise photo sparked concerns 52 years ago, world population has doubled, atmospheric CO2 levels (and temperatures) have risen steadily, deserts have grown, forests have shrunk and ancient ice caps continue to melt. Wars continue as does a worldwide pandemic and as Texans hoped rain storms would extinguish raging wild fires instead got tornadoes.
The issues are many on this planet we all share, many, too, will be the solutions. We can be proactive and work toward solutions, or we can wait and be reactive, shocked when another catastrophe comes our way. Our planet, our home, our choices.
Next month: more on using the Big Dipper to tour the Spring night sky and a lunar eclipse.
Holladay-Today On Earth
Big tree
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