Strawberries in February

Congratulations to Jennifer Figge, the first woman to swim across the Atlantic:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7877222.stm


"The season being far advanced when we were in New Orleans, the roses and magnolia blossoms were falling; but here in St. Paul it was the snow. In New Orleans we had caught an occasional withering breath from over a crater, apparently; here in St. Paul we caught a frequent benumbing one from over a glacier, apparently.
I am not trying to astonish by these statistics. No, it is only natural that there should be a sharp difference between climates which lie upon parallels of latitude which are one or two thousand miles apart. I take this position, and I will hold it and maintain it in spite of the newspapers. The newspaper thinks it is n't a natural thing; and once a year, in February, it remarks, with ill-concealed exclamation points, that while we, away up here are fighting snow and ice, folks are having new strawberries and peas down South; callas are blooming out of doors, and the people are complaining of the warm weather. The newspaper never gets done being surprised about it. It is caught regularly every February. There must be a reason for this; and this reason must be change of hands at the editorial desk. You cannot surprise an individual more than twice with the same marvel--not even with the February miracles of the Southern climate; but if you keep putting new hands at the editorial desk every year or two, and forget to vaccinate them against the annual climatic surprise, that same old thing is going to occur right along. " Mark Twain, Life on the Mississippi

February 2: 1.5 miles, , below Mile 836, Swing Bridge
http://fieldguide.fmr.org/site_detail.php?site_id=299

February 3: 1.0 miles, below Mile 835, Kaposia Village
http://fieldguide.fmr.org/site_detail.php?site_id=300