Positively MARCHing

 by Mauverneen

"March - in like a lion, out like a lamb."

March dawned yesterday, very sunny and still - not like the usual March winds we have been known to wake up to. I'm not sure what that means for the rest of the month, but I'll take it! It was so nice after a cold and snowy, rather nasty February, to have a sunny morning.  But that old saying made me wonder if there were others sayings about the month of March. Of course there are.

                                    "So many mists in March you see / So many frosts in May will be."                                                                            "As it rains in March, so it rains in June."

I'll have to keep an eye on those two predictions - keep track of the fog and rain this month and see if what the olde tyme folks had to say about May and June are true. Of course, from March sayings I got to thinking about other weather related lore. I remember my grandfather telling me that a ring around the moon meant rain was coming. And it usually does within 48 hours. And if the raindrops are large, the shower will be short. If the raindrops are small, well, you'd better have your umbrella. I couldn't find any poetry to back up the size of the raindrops, but there's plenty of science out there to tell you why there are different size drops.  As for the ring around the moon...

"Ring around the moon? Rain real soon."

There are a couple of other sayings that are pretty common that some of you may have heard. You can keep track of these easy enough to see if they hold true.

“Rain before seven, clear before eleven.”

Red sky at night, Sailors delight.

Red sky at morning, sailor take warning.

 Sometimes, the old ways, or the old wives tales, are not just fiction and pretty words but good advice. I'm sure some of you have heard that when the leaves of certain trees face upwards, it means rain is coming. Scientifically, the leaves of deciduous trees, like maples and poplars, do often turn upward before heavy rain. The leaves are actually reacting to the sudden increase in humidity that usually precedes a storm. So, yeah, you can predict rain by them. At least by some of them. So we can all be weather predictors, and lyrical ones at that.

When windows won't open and the salt clogs the shaker,

The weather will favour the umbrella maker!

. You can google more sayings for different months and different seasons, but with spring on our doorstep, that's what I'm concerned with. I want out of the house, I want to see grass, I want sunshine and flowers. I'm ready for a little rolling thunder and some large raindrops.

When dew is on the grass, rain will never come to pass.”

"When clouds appear like towers, the earth is refreshed by frequent showers."

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