March is a month of transition. Of course there is Spring Break. Then the time change and around then is the Spring Equinox and within a couple weeks, Easter will be here. Our temperatures are warming and the days are getting longer.
Equinox means equal night, which refers to the 2 days of the year when the amount of day and night are equal. On Tuesday, March 16, we had 11 hours 59 minutes and 51 seconds of daylight.
Which as close to 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of night as you can get.
The Spring Equinox is the first day of the astronomical Spring. This occurs this year on Saturday March 20. Astronomical Spring runs from March 20 until Summer Solstice Sunday June 20th.
Meteorologists (the weather folks) have slightly different start dates for the seasons.
Meteorological Spring Starts March 1 and is March, April and May. Meteorological Summer starts June 1 and consists of June, July and August.
Meteorological Seasons were created to standardize the length of seasons which traditionally varied. Some years a season would be 89 days long, while others were 93days.
The variations made it difficult to compare year to year.
Trees and wildflowers don’t care if Spring starts March 1st or March 20th- they bloom when conditions are right. The wildflowers Dead Nettle, False Wild Garlic and Henbit have been blooming for a while. Eastern Red Cedar, Bradford Pears, Elms and Redbuds are the first trees that bloom.