Field Notes—

The March Wind

It’s a warm wind, the west wind,

full of birds’ cries;  I never hear the west wind

but tears are in my eyes.   For it comes from the west lands,

the old brown hills,  And April’s in the West wind, and daffodils.

—John Masefield

By Curtiss Clark

Much is made of the March wind as it spins weathervanes from lion to lamb. The month straddles the frontier of two seasons, a haven for smugglers crossing at will from winter to spring and back again, carrying snowdrifts, snowdrops, black ice, and crocuses under the unseen cloak of the wind.

The March wind blows hot and cold, speaking in warm whispers of hope and cold coughs of despair to the credulous. To those of us wise to the feints and deceptions of March, it speaks ultimately of resignation to the West wind, which arrives as surely as the world turns, bearing April and daffodils.

We really should speak of the March winds, because there is nothing singular about them. They come at you from every direction. From the great gales and tornadoes stirred up by titanic cold and warm air masses clashing over panhandle states and continuing their brawl right through the heartland, to microscale zephyrs lasting just a few seconds traveling a few tens of yards in response to a cooling pond or a warming field, the winds of March stir in an endless variety of scale and temperament. They sear the senses with cold, and then perfume the air with the incense of early blossoms. They sting and kiss. They quicken the pulse of the living world.

Air, like water, is constantly trying to level itself, sliding into low-pressure valleys from high-pressure hills. Wind is a scion of the sun, caused by the uneven heating of the earth’s surface. Warm air rises from the equator and moves at the top of the atmosphere toward the poles, and then it cools and sinks and moves at the surface toward the equator. The rising warm air reduces the pressure in the equatorial regions, and descending cold air raises the pressure in the polar regions, setting up the flow.

If the planet didn’t spin, we would have a steady north wind in the northern hemisphere and a steady south wind in the southern hemisphere. (Yes, I know, if the planet didn’t spin it would be parched on one side, frozen on the other, and scaly flying marsupials would have dominion over a the tiny temperate band encircling the planet between the two. And you and I would be in some evolutionary waiting room. But let’s ignore that for the sake of this hypothetical.)

Fortunately, the earth does spin, which creates the Coriolis effect, shifting air masses to the right the northern hemisphere and to the left in the southern hemisphere. The rotation causes hurricanes to circulate counterclockwise above the equator and clockwise below the equator.

Not only does the earth spin, it is tilted relative to the sun, so in its annual do-si-do with Old Sol, the seasons proceed with shadows shifting north and south, creating more variety in heating differentials around the world. So in the transitional months between winter and summer, hot and cold air masses and high and low pressure systems mix it up, giving us hurricanes in the fall and lots of wind in March.

The wind this month really is a great equalizer, not only balancing high and low pressure, but evening out the advantages and disadvantages of having a hat and not having a hat, having an umbrella and not having an umbrella, and on St Patrick’s Day, wearing a kilt and not wearing a kilt.

March winds mix everything up and sort it all out again. We come out of the month a little roughed up around the edges, but we are refreshed and awake and ready for what the West wind brings.