I think it’s safe to say that most people are familiar with the concept of something called “No Mow May.” Basically, the concept promotes the idea that all mowing is put on hold during the month of May to give our pollinators the best possible start at the beginning of the growing season. This is something that I have actually tried for the past two years and I have had mixed results.

One benefit of this approach to landscape management is certainly the appearance of all kinds of wildflowers. After all, this is the whole point of No Mow May and it actually works. Give the plants a chance to grow more than three inches tall and some wonderful things can happen. But this kind of success could be tempered with some difficult results later in the month. This is especially true if the weather doesn’t cooperate.

This spring was particularly rainy. A No Mow May was almost hard to avoid as those of us who had to work had a hard time squeezing in some mowing time between the raindrops. My personal calendar also conspired to keep me away from home every weekend in May, causing the uncut areas of my yard to really get out of control. This is the problem with a whole month without lawn maintenance. You can go from lawn to field pretty quickly.

So I find myself still struggling with the outcome of this year’s No Mow May. There are still parts of my side yard that haven’t been hit by the mower and that’s because the grass is so tall that I can only chop it away a little at a time. What I really need is a mower, but Susan would kill me if I went out and bought one. I could probably make three bales of hay at best. Reality can be such a buzzing death sometimes.

So I have decided to change my approach to the No Mow May concept next year. I am going to implement a selective mowing program that leaves certain smaller areas of the yard unmowed while hitting the large area that is currently giving me so much trouble. Cutting back around the edges can still have some big benefits and I discovered an example of this just last week.

While growing in a patch of uncut vegetation at the edge of my garden I discovered a very young black raspberry plant. This thing had a mint green stem and everything was young and fresh. The leaves were gorgeous and the stems were beautiful, but what really caught my eye was the small cluster of raspberries that had miraculously gone unnoticed by the local birds. I didn’t have the right lens with me, but I knew this wouldn’t last long, so I took several shots with my 600mm lens until I got a good photo. The next day the ripe berries were gone!

This particular vegetation was easily handled by my lawnmower and if I had run over it all at the beginning of the year I would never have given the raspberry bush a chance to grow. In fact, I might have killed it outright, which would have been a shame. Now my plan is to transplant this particular plant to a better location where I can put up some wire fencing to keep the rabbits away from it during the winter. With any luck I will have a whole patch of raspberries in a few years and then I can share the harvest with the birds. A batch of homemade black raspberry muffins would be worth it!

And now the event you’ve all been waiting for: The unveiling of the squirrel names! Based on pure numbers alone, I’m going to have to go with the names “Luc” and “Frosty.” There were several variations on the spelling of these names and I struggled with the name “Luc.” I was really leaning towards “Luke”, as in Luke Skywalker, but I can also embrace “Luc” as it works with the name Jean-Luc Picard, captain of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D (and E). So spell it whichever way makes you happiest!

Frosty is the name of the squirrel that is almost all white and Luke/Luc is the name of the squirrel with the white tail. The squirrel that is half white (as if it had been relaxing in a hot tub filled with white paint) will be named “Blanche”. She soaked in the tub too long and her fur faded. Finally, the squirrel that shows remarkable lateral symmetry in the pattern of leucism will be named Rorschach. What do I see in the pattern on his coat? A mischievous demon squirrel. Darwin, give me strength. Thanks to everyone who submitted a name!

Bill Danielson has been a professional writer and nature photographer for 27 years. He has worked for the National Park Service, US Forest Service, Nature Conservancy, and Massachusetts State Parks and he currently teaches high school biology and physics. For more information visit his website at www.speakingofnature.com, or go to Speaking of Nature on Facebook.