Here comes mud season. The early week was perfect sugaring weather - warm sunny days and cold, cold nights. But the last few nights have been warm as well, staying at least several degrees above freezing. Today the rain started, and the last of the snow is melting away.

As the ground slowly thaws, it turns to mud. All that water has nowhere to go until the soil is fully unfrozen and the trees leaf out. We throw extra straw around the chicken yard to keep them from getting entirely filthy.

Of course, there's no guarantee and no reason to believe that winter is behind us. The official last frost date is still two and a half months off, and that leaves a lot of time for last-minute blizzards.