High winds and low tides

Everyone is familiar with the seasonal saying “In like a lion, out like a lamb.” But most of us probably weren’t expecting the first few days of March to be quite so ferocious.

As a kid, I was happy enough to get a day off when my school had no air conditioning on a brutally hot day, or maybe when we lost heat in the middle of winter, and of course for snow days, and one time a water main broke. However, I had never heard of a school cancellation due to high winds.

While a school cancellation is a serious inconvenience for many, I’d much rather the decision err on the side of caution than the other way around. I certainly wouldn’t have wanted to take a ride in a school bus in those winds. In fact, I didn’t have anywhere I needed to go that day, so my car stayed parked in the driveway and I didn’t venture out much.

But my kids — that’s a different story. They like playing outdoors. Cold weather, rain, even darkness can’t keep them inside. And the sun was shining so beautifully all through that wind storm, they just had to get outside and experience it for themselves.

I was a bit anxious that a tree might topple over, which happens a lot in our neighborhood when there’s inclement weather since we have so many mature trees, or that maybe a large branch might fall. The winds were so severe that even the possibility of flying debris getting in someone’s eye was a risk.

Which reminds me of another saying popular at our house: “God made dirt, and dirt don’t hurt—unless you get it in your eye.”

Well, luckily no one got any dirt in their eyes and no trees fell over in our yard. But from the sound of all the sirens and chainsaws I heard Friday afternoon, Mother Nature left plenty of destruction in her wake. In fact, on Saturday there was still a road closure due to a downed tree near my house.

Besides closing schools and roads and damaging property, those high winds also caused an unusual phenomenon along portions of the Potomac River.

We’re all familiar with high and low tides, but have you ever heard of a “blowout” tide? All that wind simply blew the water away from the shore and large sandy expanses of the river’s bottoms that are normally covered by water were exposed for all to see.

Let’s hope the end of March ushers in the lamb with blue skies and soft breezes. Easter will be here on the first of April.

Try some real syrup

One tradition at our house, and I’m sure at many of yours, is to enjoy a nice breakfast on the weekend as a family.

Scrambled eggs, a plate of bacon and a side of scrapple is my kind of meal. But what really rounds out breakfast for the kids is a plate stacked with pancakes hot off the griddle.

It’s tempting to serve those pancakes with a syrup made from corn that comes out of a microwavable plastic jug or

a bottle that pays homage to a woman known for her good cooking, but have you ever tried real, authentic maple syrup that comes from trees? If you haven’t, now’s a good time to give it a try. Your taste buds will thank me.

Cunningham Falls State Park in the Catoctin Mountains will be hosting its 48th annual Syrup Making Demonstration on the weekends of March 10

and 11 and March 17 and 18 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. each day. Festivities will take place in the William Houck Area of the park, located at 14039 Catoctin Hollow Road in Thurmont.

Visitors can take a hayride to watch sap being collected and then observe park rangers as they demonstrate the traditional way to turn the sap into sweet syrup. There’s also a hot pancake breakfast, live music and a 1.5-mille fun run/walk along the park’s scenic roadway.

Attendees are asked to donate $3 per person that will

benefit the Friends of Cunningham Falls State park and Gambrill State Park. And, bring your wallet along because you’ll want to sample the syrup at the pancake breakfast and bring home some real maple syrup for your kitchen table at an additional cash-only cost.

Call the park office at 301-2717574 for further information.

Another nest cam up

One more nest cam is up-andrunning for the 2018 spring season.

The Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries just announced that the long-running Richmond Falcon Cam went live on March 1.

The nest box is already busy with a pair of peregrine falcons making a scrape in the substrate and, if all goes well, eggs should be deposited in the nest shortly.

This year’s couple consists of the same banded male from last year and a new female. The male falcon will turn 18 this year, which is quite a long lifespan for a peregrine falcon

in the wild. According to the VDGIF, the longest-living banded falcon in the wild lived to be nearly 20.

You can read the interesting history of Richmond’s peregrine falcons at https://blog. wildlife.virginia.gov/2018/02/ celebrating-15-years-of-nesting-by-richmonds-peregrine-falcons/?utm_source=falcon_ cam_page&utm_campaign=falcon_cam and view the nest box live at https://www.dgif. virginia.gov/falcon-cam/?utm_ source=dgif_blog&utm_campaign=falcon_cam.