May is when our fields turn from dismal brown to vibrant green and our rough ponds become lush oases.
It is the month when the black and white movie in which we have been living since November turns into technicolor. May’s colors begin with a cautionary yellow even before most of the green leaves and delicate blooms arrive — the forsythia bush flowers reach their peak during the month and daffodils pop up everywhere.
Millions of bright buds and blossoms soon follow in early and mid-May. Here you see a colorful corner of flowering crabapple, white kousa dogwood, and purple lilac:
“Wild” (abandoned) apple trees retain their pride by showing that they still can bud and produce delicate blossoms despite being trapped by invasive shrubs:
On the wilder side, large parts of our fields become covered in bluets and lupines begin to emerge from their radial-leafed plants in May:
In the May bogs and woods, wild purple azaleas (rhodora) make brief appearances, galaxies of star flowers appear, lady’s slippers dangle, skunk cabbage leaves stretch, and bunchberry flowers and ferns spread, while the ponds erupt in arrow arum and fragrant water lily pads.
As for wildlife, May is when our resident white-tailed deer are starting to turn red and our painted turtles and green frogs arise from near death experiences and laze in the sun.
Our summer resident ospreys, Ozzie and Harriet, and red-winged blackbirds nest here in May and grow families that we hope to show you in next month’s Postcards From Maine.
On the recreational waterfront, May is the time to get the boats out, let the rain rinse them, and maybe take the first sail of the year in a little shellback.
May also is the month that Maine’s fleet of coastal schooners begin to cruise. The gray-hulled Mary Day and black-hulled J&E Riggin visited Brooklin’s Great Cove during the month:
Finally, May is the month that inspires us to consider life’s beginnings and ends with Mothers’ Day and Memorial Day. Here you see a sunny Brooklin road poster expressing a universal theme and a foggy Brooklin cemetery where a flag commemorates a World War II veteran:
(All images in this post were taken in Brooklin, Maine, in May of 2022.)