Driving home on Monday, a swallow swooped above the truck. Just one. How I admire that first swallow who ventures north, testing the air for food. At the farm, the first would arrive a couple weeks before the others. Sometimes the one stayed. Sometimes they disappeared until the air warmed enough to wake the flies. Then one morning, we would see a whole flock sitting on the telephone wires, diving around the tractor.

With our move, I expected to miss swallows. We had two kinds nesting in the stable of the barn. Their babies called from the nest when we came into the barn, waking to movement though we could not feed them. The adults would follow the tractor to make a meal of the insects I disturbed when cultivating the ground or mowing hay.

Seeing that one swallow made me happy: I will find them if I look. I know a bridge where a flock nests every year. And there will be these sudden glimpses as I drive through territory where they thrive.

And how can I complain? I traded swallows for an eagle. This majestic bird visits regularly, gazing at the water beyond our shore, before moving on and returning. There are ravens, too. And just like at the farm, a flock of grackles took over the bird feeder in April. These sleek, shining black birds with their fan-like tails got busy picking up what squirrels have dropped. Chickadees wait for me to fill their feeder. A pair of cardinals visit. Blue jays returned as a flock of twenty birds. Turkeys also enjoy what squirrels distribute. And every day water birds swim past.

I am missing marsh marigolds, those first bright yellow flowers with lush green leaves. Instead, I have coltsfoot with their sun-bright flowers. Their green leaves will come later. The periwinkle has a few blooms, and, between the paving stones are the tiny blue-purple flowers of creeping charlie. I do need to challenge the coltsfoot and creeping charlie where they are taking over pathways, but I certainly won't eliminate them. Their colour is a gift in this delayed spring.

Daffodils have been terribly slow to bloom here. While I have seen these flowers in town and the profusion of yellow at Mount Pleasant cemetery, here by the shore, they stalled. Their first green leaves arrived in a timely fashion, but their flower stems stayed green, hardly a hint of yellow to come. Those that other people planted have finally broken free, the yellow trumpets signaling a change in the weather. The ones I put in are slower, but they too are coming along beside the tulips that the squirrels did not find.

Lilies have sprouted through last fall's leaves. It will be a while before I know what colours the previous owners liked. I will spend all summer waiting to see what all they planted. Back at the farm, it took years to uncover all the gifts left by the family who settled that land. I would come across columbine I did not know was there. When the spruce tree I planted grew large enough, a clematis used it as a trellis. I never could find the place that plant was rooted so left it to find its own way up.

Here, I want to add organic material to the clay, and I have lots of leaves that I can dig in as well as the peat moss and compost I bought. But I have to be patient here to make sure I don't dig up something that would have been a flower or an interesting plant.

I was feeling completely impatient for spring until I saw that swallow. I might have missed it if I hadn't slowed to make a turn, if it hadn't come so close to the truck. The carpet of coltsfoot is hard to miss. The ants are tiny and hidden except when the cats notice movement. The lily flowers I have to wait for, but their leaves tell me where to look. For other things, I will have to keep my eyes open, staying vigilant so I don't miss any of the gifts of spring.

Cathy Hird lives on the shore of Georgian Bay.