Letter from aunt in California to Niece in Massachusetts October 2020 What is God telling me through nature when the world around me is going up in flames? This has been a record year for wildfires in California. To date, over four million acres have burned. All I can think of is Sodom and Gomorrah, where Lot fled the burning city with his wife and daughters. The wife looked back and turned to a pillar of salt, but Lot and…..
Watching the White-breasted Nuthatch more carefully this morning (what choice did I have–he was the only bird in sight) I wondered why he pecked at the bark of the oak. Was he digging for bugs? Then he skittered down the tree, snatched a seed from the seed platform, and skittered back up, depositing the seed in the hole he had just dug. Who needs books to teach them about birds (says the librarian) when you can just watch them and…..
Appreciating the differences of birds is noting not just how they look, but how they behave. The Western Bluebirds love to get in the bird bath and splash around like toddlers in a swimming pool. The House Sparrows never seem to take more than a dainty drink from the “public bath,” but I have witnessed them wallowing in a pile of dirt some groundhog or mole dug up. Can the bluebird say to the sparrow: “I’m better than you because…..
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Two Green Herons perched on fence posts are watching the drying grasses of the vernal pool. A tiny toad struggled across the sidewalk at my feet, giving me an idea of what the herons might be watch for. This one got away! My feeding station seemed deserted, but I heard a noisy House Finch jabbering away. Every now and then a small flock of about ten of them would take over the station, then take off in a flash. The…..
When you have to be alone, and can’t socialize or go where people are, birdwatching is an ideal past-time. It gets you outside and takes your mind off stressful circumstances. Sit still in a corner of your yard. No birds? Stare at the leaves of a tree or bush. Wait for the birds to get curious about you. They are already there, watching you, but they are masters of camouflage. Maybe you can fool them out of hiding by writing…..
A flock of Lesser Goldfinch just flew into the tree outside the large library window. There’s another flock in the tree ten feet beyond it. The birds look like leaves bouncing in a breeze and won’t be still for a moment. Whoops. Now they are still like the leaves when the air is still. Or have they flown away? A third flock zips in to join them and they are lively again. There must be at least thirty. Did they…..
It has been raining for hours. The vernal pool has more water and has attracted a Great Blue Heron, as well as several Gadwells and American Wigeons. Two small flocks of Canada Geese just flew off, each with their usual commotion as they took their place in their formation and began circling the pool before the leader led them where he (?) wanted to go (I suppose). Or was all the cacophony a discussion of where they were to go?…..
I finally saw a Fairy Shrimp with my own eyes! Gaylene, the Biologist from the Wildlife Heritage Foundation, who checks the Fairy Shrimp levels in the vernal pool periodically, was here at our drying pool to check levels again. I watched from the library window as she slogged through the mud and puddles of the drying slush of the pool. When she got back to the edge by the parking lot, I was there to see what she had gathered…..
“First you try to tell me that field of grass is a vernal pool. I don’t see any water. Then you tell me it has Fairy Shrimp in it! You are telling me a fairy tale!” It’s dry right now, after the fire season, I tried to explain to my skeptic friend. Then the fall and winter rains come, and the field begins to fill with water, going from a few puddles to a pond, and eventually a small lake……
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