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A moist and warming day. Some rain overnight has lifted the humidity, and spring birds seem satisfied with the development. A catbird emerged a short while ago from the undergrowth out back to give a loud proclamation. Gray squirrels and a chipmunk foraged beneath the feeder. And if you listen, you can hear more than one clutch of nestlings. The tree-hole starlings, of course—the adults soar down like tiny stealth bombers, one after another, with a purpose. Soon their young will fly. And I heard for the first time what must be the contents of a robin's nest within some latticework attached to the house next door.
For hawks and ravens hereabouts, spring's a hard mission, under constant attack by smaller birds. But the sun is out, and leaves are unfurling. The squirrel carcass has vanished. Heard or seen, meantime, are: mourning doves, nuthatch, crow, ovenbird, song sparrow, herring gulls, chickadees, the catbird, goldfinches, house finches, a parula warbler, the towhee (singing again this morning), robins, grackles, a blue jay, flicker, and a white-throated sparrow. | |||||
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Bird Report is a discursive, intermittent record of what's outside my window in Rockport, Maine, USA (44°08'N latitude, 69°06'W longitude). —Brian Willson | |||||
Last evening, a raven's complaint called me to the side door: the big black bird—a young one, probably—was croaking up a storm from a low oak limb not 20 feet away. It ducked and thrust as a pair of crows swooped in from all angles. (Must be the crows nesting in the tip of a pine up the hill.) After a little while, it occurred to me that the raven must have roadkill on its mind—and sure enough, it veered down once toward the remnants of the roadside squirrel, which I noticed had moved several yards from its resting place of a couple days ago. The raven had tried to carry it away, I figure, but the crows prevented that plan, and eventually the three of them flapped crazily away across the road, two against one.
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