All photographs are courtesy of, and copyrighted to, my daughter Anne Sidnell

It was March 2oth yesterday, the date of the spring equinox for 2017. Officially, it is the first day of spring here, but the weather is still cold; last week we had a snowstorm and only the snowdrops, true to their name, have dared to show their faces.

I recently heard a meteorologist arguing passionately that we should stop calculating the seasons on the basis of where the earth is positioned in relation to the sun, as astronomers do, choosing the solstices and equinoxes to neatly divide the year, and consider only earthly conditions.

Meteorologists base their seasonal calendar on the annual temperature cycle. And of course we do in fact make our minds up about whether and when spring has arrived in our own corner of the world depending on the weather.

Some bloggers I follow have…