Signs of Spring at UNM

I don't have any empirical data, but my sense is that the UNM campus is generally about 10 days ahead of our plot of ground in the north valley. By last Friday, [April 15th] the chives around the fountain were starting to bloom! Ours have buds just starting to swell. I admire them for having made it through that intense January cold-spell. What a miracle, really. (While at the fountain, I chased a bee around trying to get a close-up. She wasn't impressed. They are utterly "busy bees.")

The other BIG news is that I saw my first Barn Swallows! I should go back to the Cornell site to remind myself where they go for the winter. (Were my 4 or 6 literal 'early birds' tired?! Our weather has been unseasonably warm, so they arrived to find hoards of bugs to eat, thanks to all the artificial watering!) I have been watching out and missing them, so it was treat to find them perching under the eaves in a nearby building.