THE COLOR FOR the week is unmistakably green. It might be pastel, lime or just plain green-green, but everything is coming up in some shade of spring’s color.

There are several stands of tamarack that I have gotten to know as intimate friends over the years and as I traipsed through a couple of them last week, I couldn’t help but applaud the fresh, new green rapidly covering up stark gray branches that were all the trees had to offer through a long, cold winter.

Hazel brush and other undercover all through our north Wisconsin forests have buds that are rapidly opening into tiny green leaves. Soon, you won’t be able to see a neighbor’s house through the brush, nor will you be able to see an open expanse of a favorite lake through a dense stand of alder crowding the shoreline.

Around my house, brown needles of white pine which carpeted the lawn are gone, since the boss of the homestead decreed I would not wait until July to put a rake and leaf blower to good use in clearing them from young blades of grass greening up under our white pines.

My flower beds are sprouting in various shades of green as perennials spring to life. Daffodils that bloomed in profusion last spring didn’t produce a single bud this spring after being rudely transplanted last summer to a new home surrounding our mailbox.

A couple different breeds of catmint showing tints of gray mixed with pale green are getting a strong start to the spring season. They have always been a proficient bloomer for me and after about 30 years, you can find them in several places in and out of flower beds around my house. Profuse spreaders, I periodically have to move some out of flower beds and into any open spot I can find in the yard, trees and little valley next to the house.

Daylilies, some of which got a little frostbite earlier this spring, are growing like mad now, adding their pale green colors to the landscape. Jacob’s ladder with multicolored leaves woven into a green fabric are showing off in one flower bed. In my shady areas, several varieties of hosta, a big favorite of green-leaved perennials for me, are little more than stalks pushing up now, but soon, their broad leaves, some of them spreading nearly 3 feet, will brighten my days with various shades of green, topped by white or lavender flowers later on.

Some species of popple or aspen if you will are among the first trees to add green to our northern woodlands and their changeover from bare winter branches is well underway.

Checking out one of my duck-watching lakes a couple days ago, I saw old, green lily pads flopping in the breeze that was blowing across the shallow, muck-bottomed lake. It will be a little longer yet, but around the edges of that same lake there will soon be tall fronds of beautiful green cattails swaying in the breeze and dense stands of pickerelweed showing off in masses of dark green leaves and huge spikes of deep purple flowers.

From the waters themselves I have taken generous helpings of green already this spring. I can’t tell you how many woodland ponds I have hiked to in the last few weeks, always looking for glossy green heads of drake mallards and even dressier green, red and white heads of drake wood ducks at their glorious breeding season best.

I haven’t gotten tired yet of the pale green flanks of the northern pike I’ve been catching, nor the darker, sometimes bluish-tinged green sides of bluegills that have found their way into my fish basket and later, into my frying pan.

It will take longer for hardwoods, including oak, maple and ash, to start showing off their coats of green, but after winter months of looking at branches of various shades of black and gray outlined against a snow-white background, all that green will be welcome indeed.

When I fish the Brule, White and Namekagon rivers this week, I’ll miss seeing the brilliant yellow flowers the marsh marigolds sprout in profusion, but even though it might be a little early for the flowers, the lush green of the plants themselves will be on full display, diverting my attention now and then from the business at hand of trying to fool a few trout.

Fiddleheads, if they haven’t already in some places, will be popping up soon. Some people enjoy them in salads, something I have yet to try. I enjoy the light green of the newly sprouting curled heads, knowing that throughout the summer, as full grown ferns, they will transform large swaths of our forests with lush green fronds.

As a child I used to devote lots of my time in the summer to snake hunting; not to kill, but to play with for a little while. Oftentimes, that playing around meant trying to slip a little fellow down the back of a friend’s shirt, especially if that friend was an unsuspecting girl.

Little grass snakes, beautifully green, were one of my favorites. They never tried to bite a friend like me and I do believe they liked being handled in a friendly, gentle manner.

Blue has always been my very favorite color, unless you are talking about Bucky Badger red, but come spring, no color quite matches fresh green in the month of May.