Conk-a-reeeee!
I sit in my study, waiting out yet another late-winter snow storm. But I know that spring is here. The visual signs are missing, but the auditory signals are certain.
Conk-a-reeeee!
By the still-frozen riverbanks, ponds, and marshes, one of the earliest announcers of spring has been passing through since early March. Nine inches of black feathers, he stretches his neck skyward, opens his pointed bill, and belts out nasal, gurgling phrases that can only be called a “song” by another of this species.
A Murder of Crows was a 1998 suspense film that you've probably never heard of. Reviews were so bad that oblivion was its natural state rather than something into which it faded. A Murder of Crows is also the name of rock bands in Michigan, Washington state, and San...
If you have never seen a Snowy Owl, this is the winter to do so. Snowy Owls have irrupted into New England and been commonly reported in the mid-Atlantic states. At least one even wandered as far south as Jacksonville, Fla. I have seen reports of seven Snowy Owls...
Bird calls are very difficult to distinguish. Most are some form of “chip,” which sounds like every other “chip” to anyone who does not have an auditory acuity, a great memory, and lots of experience. However, there is one “chip” that I recognize almost all the time and wherever I am. It is a “chip” - or, as some render it, “tchip” - that I hear from my feeders when the sky is just beginning to lighten in the morning.
It was a clear, crisp, December day. The mid-afternoon sun gave a warm golden glow to the southern flank of Black Mountain along Rice Farm Road in Dummerston. We were winding down our long day on the Christmas Bird Count. We stopped to do a quick check of the scrubby fields, not expecting to find much. We could not have been more wrong. In the shrubby berry bushes, we first heard cedar waxwings, then saw them moving rapidly, voraciously feeding...
I love the seashore and beach most of the year. I am not too keen about the seashore during the summer when the sun is producing melanoma and the sand is littered with debris that has drifted from inland, scattered in nearly naked lumps all over the place. But in the fall, winter, and spring, that debris has been gathered up and returned to its cityscape. Then the seashore beach is in its elemental form. The rising and falling tides...
The emailer was driving along Route 142 near the Connecticut River when she saw a bird just above the water. “This bird was big!” she wrote. “Very light, mottled feathers, mostly white, but what really caught my eye was the distinctive black eye 'patch.' “As I watched, the bird made a very tight circle, folded its wings, and dove straight into the water! It flew back out, apparently unsuccessful, because I did not see anything in its talons.” She saw...
In the last couple of weeks, entertainment duties in my backyard venue have been taken over by my favorite bird, the Tufted Titmouse. A troupe of these tiny, crested, gray birds gather around the feeders, coming in from all directions, grabbing a seed, and taking off in all directions. There is at least one family, with at least six members - it is hard to count because they are always on the move. When an adult flies to the maple...