IN CASE ANYONE WONDERED

Since the first warmish, dry week of the year has finally arrived, I have finally started pruning the orchard trees.

Already the sap is up, the buds are swelling, and it's time to be getting the final dormant spray applied. I have not used pesticides or such for fifteen years or more, but the lime-sulfur and horticultural oil spray combination when applied mid-winter and again just before the blossom buds open is truly essential to having any fruit develop in this wet, "west-of-the-Cascade-Mountains" region.

I usually gripe my way through this task, but being outdoors, in the shirt-sleeve warmth for the first time since October is really refreshing and restorative to my SAD condition this sodden winter. I'm determined to just enjoy this first annual chore of each new calendar year. If nothing else, I enjoy the degree of quiet afforded away from telephone and television, although I do listen to a lot of NPR from the local FM outlet.

After the orchard trees, come the yard trees and landscaping shrubs, spring clean-up, lawn care, setting up the "arbor" for orchid cactus and such, and eventually, I have to hand paint the house this year. The camping trailer needs de-winterizing, beds and driveways will need raking, debris will have to be hauled, and repairs - including some restorative caulking - already demands my attention. The firewood piles need to be restacked and recovered, the large stones have to be realigned and repositioned along the driveway, and next will be the garage calling for its spring reorganization and sorting. There are never fewer, easier chores, you know.

At least I have a neat, western-style birdhouse already installed and dressing up the back yard. Thanks, Geoffrey. It's Neat!!

And doesn't it look grand?