Mad For March

With sporting seasons at an end and precocious weather persisting, the first sights and sounds of spring warm the heart of a countryman, writes Sir Johnny Scott

- Sir Johnny Scott

THE wheel of the seasons changes in March, leaving a melancholy vacuum in the lives of sportsmen; hunting finishes, shooting is over, the grey geese have gone, fishing has barely started and winter is reluctant to loose its grip, reducing point-to-point secretaries to sobs. And yet, regardless of how precocious the weather may be, March is the harbinger of warmth, fertility, regrowth and plenty. As daylight lengthens towards the Vernal Equinox and flows into our woodlands and hedgerows, a green haze appears as bare branches begin to bud and leaves unfurl. Wild daffodils, daisies, wood anemones, coltsfoot, dandelion, celandine, primroses and marsh marigolds bloom. Gorse bushes become a riot of gold on hillsides, hedgerows are festooned with drifts of tiny white blackthorn flowers and on a warm day after a shower of rain one can almost sense the grass growing.