It's May. You planted for pollinators. You went to the plant sales. You did everything right. So why does your garden look like nothing but green?

What you're experiencing has a name: the bloom gap. That in-between stretch after the spring ephemerals finish and before the summer perennials take over. It's not failure. It's a pause. And nature has been doing it on purpose for thousands of years.

In this episode: a yellow sign on a train platform, an Eastern Towhee 60 miles apart on consecutive days, a wood thrush singing from the canopy for the first time this year, and why the Eastern red columbine blooms exactly when it does. For someone very specific who just got back from Central America.

Your garden knows what it's doing. This episode will help you trust it.

Audio recordings of the wood thrush provided by xeno-canto.org:

CitationPaul Driver, XC771930. Accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/771930.

License

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0

Episode 26 | Site Fidelity: An Old Farm Field and a Date in April

Slow down, pay close attention to the small, quiet signs around us. Growth isn’t usually dramatic. It’s the little changes that tell the real story.

Imagine taking a photo of the same spot each year and watching it evolve. That’s real progress—slow, steady, undeniable. It's a reminder that transformation is ongoing, even when we don’t see it immediately.

Birds can navigate an entire continent, survive a winter somewhere else, including evading predators, and habitat loss along the way. And then return. How?

In this episode, I intertwine the two: a yearly photo I take in my yard, and a warbler that keeps showing up in the same farm field three years in a row.

Every spring, I witness the return of familiar faces: hummingbirds, Baltimore orioles, and the masked common yellowthroat, arriving precisely on schedule.

They embody nature's reliability, contrasting sharply with our human tendency to forget or arrive late. In today’s episode I talk in particular about a tiny warbler that weighs less than the change in your pocket.

Resources & Mentions:

Read the Story: For the full article on this bird, Loss vs Gain – Measured in Grams click here: https://wildbirdresearch.org/loss-vs-gain-measured-in-grams/.

Volunteer Spotlight: Learn more about The Wild Bird Research Group, where my husband and I volunteer. https://wildbirdresearch.org/

Join the Community: Subscribe to my Weekly Newsletter for more nature stories.

Common Yellowthroat recording by William Whitehead (XC720362) via xeno-canto.org.

I read Doug Tallamy’s books and transformed my yard, but the real work started after the planting was done. Samantha explores the "after" of habitat restoration: the small observations, the roadside discoveries, and the reality of gardening for wildlife.

Learn why native plants are a long-term investment, how "volunteers" can save you money, and why the hardest sell in gardening is simply having the patience to wait for the bloom. If you're a new listener looking for the heart behind the habitat, this episode is for you.The Tallamy Effect: What happens to your perspective after reading Nature's Best Hope.

The $9 Investment: Why "pasta-sized" native plants are the hardest sell but the highest reward.

Roadside Rescue: A story about Wild Geranium, Golden Alexander, and how one person can change local mowing schedules.

The Opportunity Garden: How native plants like Wild Bergamot and Chokeberry "volunteer" to save you money over time.https://homegrownnationalpark.org/

Companion Article: https://open.substack.com/pub/flutterbymeadows/p/i-read-doug-tallamys-books-heres?utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web

In this episode, I mention an old piece I wrote about a roadside mowing that was difficult to “un-see”. If you would like to read it, click on the link below.

So Much For No Mow May

Thanks for listening!

“The best relationships aren’t the ones that look perfect right away. They’re the ones that become something over time.”

There’s no store front for friendships. Friendships take time to build. They often come with setbacks too. But over time, common threads connect people, and relationships take shape.

“We don’t pick our friends off of a shelf and get instant gratification. If anything, they require time and effort.”

In this episode, I take a look at the parallels between building friendships and native plant gardening, emphasizing patience, effort, and growth over time.

Today I saw my first tiger swallowtail of the season. The butterfly flew across the deck and over the roofline. But here’s what I keep thinking about—before that butterfly, there was a caterpillar. Awkward. Slow. Nothing about a caterpillar announces what it’s becoming. Same thing with the chrysalis that it was all winter in leaf litter, or hidden in the bark of a tree. Completely unassuming.

Like a friendship in year one.

Like me in 2016, confidently mispronouncing “monarda fistulosa” and having no idea what a host plant was.

When I first started planting native species, they looked unassuming & messy—nothing like the perfect nursery.

You can't buy a friendship off a shelf already in bloom. You can't rush a caterpillar either.

Find more to this story and the friendship I am celebrating over here on Substack. (It's free!)

Wild bergamot (Monarda fistulosa) showed up in my rain garden in April uninvited — and it's one of the best native pollinator plants for much of the US and southern Canada (excluding Florida and the far West coast.) We will also discuss insights on identifying mystery seedlings, native plant behavior, and the lessons they teach us about patience and persistence in our own day to day lives.

April has a way of making you doubt yourself. The very FIRST day of the month starts off in let’s play a joke mode. The spring garden is a tricky lot.

You stand over a patch of soil where you know you dug a hole and planted something (or did I?)…and nothing looks familiar. Just green. Indistinguishable, quiet, and slightly suspicious. Yet honest.

Where Did They Go?

Key topics in this episode include

Native plant identification and growth patterns

Resilience of plants crossing boundaries and thriving

Patience in gardening and life lessons from nature

And for the first time, there’s a full YouTube video to go with it. But if you still prefer the audio only, that is not going to change.

If your garden feels quiet right now…it might not be behind. It might just be getting ready.

Read the original piece on wild bergamot that inspired this episode.

http://flutterbymeadows.com/natures-resiliency/

In life, transitions are inevitable. They often come disguised as uncertainty or discomfort, like the space between winter and spring. Just as nature slowly awakens from its slumber, we too can learn to move forward, even when we feel stuck.

Nature provides a perfect metaphor for understanding transitions. Take the Eastern towhee, for instance, which eases into its full song. It reminds us that growth takes time. Similarly, during the first days of spring, we see the landscape in shades of brown, yet beneath the surface, life is stirring. Recognizing this can help us appreciate our own growth processes, even when they feel slow.

And April is finally here. Even if we are still a little in-between.

PS. I did finally put away my suitcase before I hit publish on this episode.

Audio recordings of the Eastern towhee provided by xeno-canto.org:

CitationDavid A. Brinkman, XC645749. Accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/645749.

CitationDavid A. Brinkman, XC779377. Accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/779377.

License

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0

Most nights in the Galápagos, while the National Geographic Islander II moved between islands, everyone went below. I stayed on deck, with stars as my never-ending ceiling.

I began to realize, you don't need to know what something is to know it matters. But it's important to stay on deck long enough to find out.

Join Samantha as she recounts her transformative journey to the Galápagos Islands, exploring wildlife, nature's wonders, and the lessons of curiosity and perception. Discover how this adventure rekindled her childlike wonder and deepened her understanding of the natural world.

Key Topics

Wildlife diversity in the Galapagos

The impact of travel on curiosity and perception

Navigation and adaptation in nature

Galapagos Islands, wildlife, curiosity, nature, travel, exploration, wildlife navigation, natural wonders, personal growth, adventure

Sound bite of swallow-tailed gull provided by: Citation

Charlie Vogt, XC443050. Accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/443050.

License

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0

“That bird was going to rearrange my entire life. Not dramatically. Not all at once. Just quietly—the way a native plant works its way through a crack in the pavement. Slowly. And then completely.”

This is the origin story of Flutter By Meadows—and, in essence, The Flutter By Effect.

In this conversation, I reflect on my connection with nature, specifically, my first encounter with a tree swallow, a moment that sparked a decade-long journey of discovery and appreciation for the natural world. I emphasize the importance of curiosity, observation, and the stories that nature has to tell.

You will gain a better understanding of what sparked me to author a blog and a podcast. I am hoping to invite others to notice the beauty around them and to engage with the environment in meaningful ways.

If you need me between now and the spring equinox, Episode 20 leaves you my whereabouts.

My Free Substack Where All My Nature Essays are Housed

You can also find additional reads here at my blog.

Or on Instagram

Chapters

00:00 The Arrival of the Tree Swallow

02:56 A Journey of Discovery

06:01 The Rituals of Nature

09:01 Curiosity and Connection

12:02 The Impact of a Single Bird