NH Outside: Birds Archives

By Helen Downing, UNH Cooperative Extension Master Gardener volunteer

"Nice job, Helen," whispered my husband. I had raised my coffee cup and inadvertently startled three crows we were observing out a kitchen window. As they flew off, I watched carefully and noticed the crow I called Hopalong. Pointing this out to my spouse, he too acknowledged noticing this particular individual as he worked in the yard a week or so before.

Hopalong hopped on one strong foot to find food in our alternately wet, snowy, icy, muddy backyard, and kept his other foot close to his body. Spring was coming in lurches and stutter- steps, and the hopping crow continued to return daily.

A few days later, I watched again as Hopalong and two other crows found much to eat in the combined snow, ice, and mud below one of our birdfeeders. Suddenly, one took off as if to fly away, but instead flew at Hopalong, and they did a split-second barrel roll before the aggressor flew off with Hopalong in pursuit.

What was that about, I wondered? Later, I learned that crows often show their interest in raising a family together in just this manner. Could Hopalong be a Herpalong?

Unfortunately, that was the last I saw of the hopping crow. Summer arrived and crows dropped in fairly often to raid the corn we spread for our flock of chickens, to dig up the newly emerging corn seedlings in the garden rows, and to dig in the muddier spots for grubs to feed their young. Often we heard young crows and their odd yelping attempts to "crow" like their parents. I hoped one of those parents was Hopalong.

One fall evening, as I headed out to close up the chicken coop, dark clouds lowering and raindrops sprinkling from a retreating nor'easter, a murder of crows dropped from the cloud cover and proceeded to fly in tight, back-and-forth formations, in search of a place to roost. It was probably the largest gathering I had ever seen--¬40 to 50 would be no exaggeration.

Crows roost in numbers in the fall and winter. In cold, harsh winters they may migrate short distances south of their summer homes during daylight hours to find shelter and food.

As the crows settled into a nearby well-forested ravine, I noticed that they weren't the only birds arriving in my backyard: tiny red-breasted nuthatches and slate-gray juncos blended in with the grass of our backyard popped up suddenly, only to quickly fly away as daylight waned. If I had come out just a few minutes later, I would never have known how busy the migrant bird traffic had been!
Although my intentions were good, I didn't emerge early enough in the morning to see the crows leave. That must have been a raucous departure.


Not so many days after, I began filling a birdfeeder with black-oil sunflower seeds, a favorite choice of chickadees, nuthatches, and juncos, when I came face to face with another arrival from the north. The first hint I got was a song, musical and trilling, that reminded me of a purple finch, but not quite. I then looked more carefully into the lilac bush that holds the feeder: the chest had a pale pink blush, the beak long and thin, a dark streak through the eye, and finally, a bit of red on the head and tail. The hint of red in the head feathers gave this finch a name: Mr. Red Poll.

As winter has progressed with more and more inches of powdery, fluffy snow, the suet I added to supplement the sunflowers seeds placed in feeders earlier has been a big seller especially among the woodpeckers, downy and hairy. They chatter at me peevishly when their stores get low and wait nearby while I refill their wire suet holders.

Nearby the chickadees call and whistle to remind me to hurry and get out of their way. They want sunflower seeds. NOW! Patiently the goldfinches, nuthatches, white and red-breasted, and the red polls line up nearby to return as soon as I leave. Noisily, the blue jays move in and prowl the ground for dropped seeds and nuggets of suet. Once more, I have had to resort to snowshoes as the snowdrifts become too deep to wade.

As the February sun gets warmer and the evening darkness comes later, I am reminded of Hopalong Crow, and wonder how long it will be before, and if, she will return.

Photo credit:

  by  decodrama visual 

My morning routine usually involves rising about 6:45 a.m. I prepare a pot of coffee and some toast to accompany my juice-and-banana-augmented Wheaties. I usually check the bird feeders out the back window during the preparations. Mostly I see finches and chickadees flitting about.

Not so the morning I got my first close-up of turkeys feeding. Not just one but 10 of the wild variety. Actually, they weren't as wild as I had originally thought. Available food seems to have a calming effect on them. Either that or they feel more confident as their numbers increase.

As they tired of grazing under the feeders, they took a leisurely stroll around the end of the house where our bedroom is located. My wife let out a yelp and called to me to come and look. Leaving my Wheaties to soak, I went in to see where the turkeys were going next. There seemed to be a definite leader. He (I assumed at first it was a he) stopped, they all stopped and began scuffing the ground, pulling out little divots of grass and pecking where it had been removed. I presumed they were seeking insects.

The parade proceeded up-slope into the front yard with the leader in the front and a scattered V of nine bringing up the rear. As I watched, I saw a definite pattern in the organization of the group.

There seemed to be a pecking order. Any challenge to position seemed to bring an aggressive response. Some birds bringing up the rear seemed a little less plump, and I assumed that survival of the most aggressive was the rule.
I have since been informed (by my editor, who consulted the state turkey biologist, Ted Walski) that what I'd considered a pecking order led by a dominant tom was more likely a hen or two and a few juveniles from last season's brood. That led me to believe that lead hen might be meting out discipline or perhaps training her offspring.

As they proceeded up the driveway toward the road, the leader looked to the left and then the right, as if she knew to watch out for road traffic. Satisfied there was no danger, she quickly got the troops across the road to the neighbor's front-yard feeder, where they re-established the pecking order and proceeded to clean up around that location.

They ended up under the giant oak tree at the edge of my neighbor's yard. Since there was no shortage of fat acorns, they seemed to forget the pecking order, and the assembly became less organized. After the acorn fest, they disappeared into the adjacent woods.

During the past month, the turkeys have staged several repeats of the show. The only difference is that they all seemed to have gained weight. Maybe they will take up residence in the adjacent woods for the winter so I can continue my observations and become more skilled in interpreting what I observe.

I've noticed that turkeys don't make a lot of noise as they feed and move about. I lived on a farm as a youth and raised chickens and guineas, both of which made a lot of noise while they were feeding. I guess being wild makes turkeys more cautious about making a lot of noise when they enter the areas of human habitation.

Recently, I was discussing the turkeys I had seen with my son-in-law. He proceeded to take out the turkey call that he uses during the hunting season and demonstrated his full repertoire of call sounds. He mentioned that the call came with a compact disc of instructions that allowed him to practice before he got out to where the turkeys are. He said you have to think like a mature tom and listen for sounds that hens make.

First he did the "cluck-and-purr" sounds of the hens. Then he did the kee-dee sound of the young turkey lost from the flock. He moved along to what he called the "fly-down cackle" and an "adult-assembly" call, both of which are used by the hens to make sure the poults follow her lead.

Last, he demonstrated the call you hear only if you're close to the roosting tree because it's used to communicate with the other turkeys on the roost. I was amazed. Such a variety of calls from birds I'd observed as largely silent. Maybe I'll borrow my son-in-law's call to see if I can learn to talk to my flock.

By Bill Dawson, Community Tree Steward

In the corner of the old chicken coop, I discovered two electric incubators with the manufacturer’s directions still attached to the bottoms. I volt-tested the heating elements and time-tested the timers. Everything seemed in order, so I ordered fertilized eggs: 50 chicken, 10 ducks, and two Toulouse goose, a perfect project to accompany starting seeds, birthing goat kids, and staying warm while waiting for spring.

The eggs all hatched, and the chicks peeped and pecked as I moved them from the incubator to cardboard boxes, to free-range cages, and then to their final destinations. The chickens joined the other 50 in the henhouse, the ducks took ownership of the frog pond in the back of the farm, and the geese became my constant companions.

Even though I never did learn their genders, I named the larger goose Festus and the other Molly. By midsummer they’d grown tall enough to tug at my belt and weighed 25 pounds each. They paraded around the farm paddocks, gardens and yards at will in their shades of grey, slate and mauve layered against mottled white bottoms and bibs. Their long, thick necks waved with each waddling step, as they whistled and cooed with their big orange beaks.

They wandered my gardens as I worked, finding grubs, bugs, and seeds. A few times each day they skirted the buildings and paddock to the frog pond to take a dip and harass the ducks.

Dawn brought the hen-house rooster, Hannibal, crowing to his egg-layers. He’d be joined shortly by Ralph­the barn-dwelling bandy rooster­in a back-and-forth competition for the best morning announcements. Then Festus and Molly would join the chorus with their long, low hisses and honks. It was time to start the farm day.

After two hours of morning chores, I’d open the farm stand. Festus and Molly would often join me to dust themselves on the edge of the driveway or to amuse the customers.

My day usually ended a few hours after dusk. I’d sit on a long wooden bench near the back porch door. The outside light attracted moths, which in turn attracted spiders, great-end-of-day snacks for Festus and Molly.

They’d sit on either side of me as I stroked their sleek bodies. They’d stretch out on one side and then the other as I pulled at their wings and rubbed their bellies, all the while whispering to each other whatever they were thinking of this activity. They’d pick at my boots and tug my pant cuffs in the flickering light. After a few minutes they’d disappear under the porch into their reinforced and screened enclosure for the night.

That fall the ducks flew away with the migrating wild flocks. The chickens were either laying productively or had become roasters. Festus and Molly were full-grown­beautiful, proud, and serene. They noticed the absence of the ducks and wandered the edge of the pond looking in all the spots once crowded with color and quacking.

A flock of Canada Geese flew over one cloudy afternoon. Festus stretched out as long as he could. He began to run low to the ground, beating his great wings. Sadly, a 500-year ancestry of farm domestication, coupled with the fact that he was a very well-fed goose, made it impossible to transform his runway antics into flight. He honked, rolled, and ended up flopping in an undignified pile. Molly rushed over to assure him that no one had seen, that his place on the farm was secure, and that he was right where he belonged.

Later that afternoon we three slowly strolled and padded back to the big barn, where I introduced Molly and Festus to their winter home, a sturdy straw-filled stall with chicken wire above and a large three-turn covered ramp to an outside door facing south. This would be much better than under the porch for the coldest weather.

Molly never did lay an egg, so for all I know both geese were boys, but she stayed Molly
‘til the day she died. I continued my end-of-day ritual whether the geese were in residence under the porch or in the barn. We’d become friends of a feather, and would stay that way for many years.

By Stephania Pearce, Master Gardener

In September I harvested sweet potatoes for the first time ever. Last December I’d noticed sprouts (“slips”) peeking from the top of a brown paper bag left beside the refrigerator at work. Instruction provided by our Cooperative Extension fruit and vegetable specialist steered me in the right direction, and I was off on a new gardening adventure.

The Yukon Gold potatoes were small, the harvest sparse, and the tubers have Black Scurf, a disease caused by a fungus called Rhizoctonia solani. This disease is in the soil, and there is no remedy. It may not be a concern for my next year’s garden, because I might not be here.

My house is for sale, which means my gardens are also for sale. It’s unsettling, not knowing the fate of the gardens I’ve nurtured for eight years. Will it be me planting the seeds next year, or a stranger? Will it even be planted?

Volunteer tomatillos are scattered around the garden, lanky plants whose small, green fruits are covered by papery husks. New Hampshire is a bit cold to mature this southern crop successfully, but I can’t bring myself to weed the seedlings when they appear. This is the third generation I have let take up precious space. The originals sprouted from a year-old bag of tomatillos I discovered in my freezer and tossed into the garden on a whim.

My strawberry bed has two bright red berries ready to pick. Why these June-bearers have fruited again in September is beyond me.

Asparagus ferns lean gently over the basil. The first row is five years old, the fronds longer and fuller than those sprouting from the new roots I planted in June. Three years until the first harvest is the rule of thumb I follow. Will the new owners know this? Will they recognize the stout shoots peeking through the leaf mulch in May? So much time and energy invested in this area.

And so much history entwined in garden plants: the French tarragon from a high school friend, the rhubarb from my dad’s backyard garden at my childhood home, the bee balm from my mom’s garden. The hummingbirds come to it as soon as the spiky red flowers start to bloom.

The emotional investment is larger than I realized. When I turned this grassy area over, I believed it would be my forever garden. I spent eight years establishing herbs, blueberry bushes, brambles and fruit trees, nourishing the soil with compost, wood ash, and fish fertilizer. This past spring I built nine raised beds for the vegetables. The previous summer’s rains had eroded the free-standing beds, rivers of rainwater flowing in the low lying spaces.


Can I walk away and start anew? Will my history here be lost? Will the lemon balm regain its stranglehold on the northeast side? Will the relentless crabgrass take over without my obsessive nightly weeding in the early season? I don’t have answers.

A slight breeze stirs the air; acorns rain down from the large oak near me. I hope I don’t get bonked. I never considered cutting down the tree to let in more sunlight. It stands tall, regal, and straight, and possesses many board feet of good lumber. It survived the fencing that ran along the property before I lived here. The scars of rusty wire poke out the backside. The oak has survived my garden’s need for sun. Will it survive new owners?

I planted the Ginkgo tree on the edge of the garden as a temporary home when my parents moved. This is its second summer. It has thrived, surviving the relocation, and will come with me. I’ve noted in the home disclosure that it will not remain on the property. The family ties are too strong to leave behind.

I sit back on my heels, wiping the dirt from my hands. Who knows, I may still be here next spring. I’m learning that moving is a lot like gardening. There are unknowns, things that are out of my control. When is it safe to plant sweet potatoes? Will someone make an offer? Will the first frost come early? Will the Ginkgo tree survive another move? Will someone make a higher offer on the house I’ve decided I want to call home?

I may not have answers, but I do sense that connections to place are important. They give a feeling of belonging, of family history. I will leave the soil here, but I can take memories of sweet potatoes and tomatillos with me.

The next person who digs in this garden will create her­or his­own ties here, as I will create new ties. Maybe the green tomato hornworms won’t follow me to my new garden.

By Suzanne Hebert, Volunteer

It was a beautiful late spring day when my husband, Jay, ventured out for a round of golf. He decided to play a New Hampshire course he’d never played before but had heard was good. Placed with a threesome of thirty-somethings, he immediately struck up a conversation about the course (the others had played it several times) and the hazards that lay ahead.

At the 10th hole each of the players teed off, the best golfer of the four hitting long and straight down the middle of the fairway. Two of the others hooked the ball to the left and my husband’s ball, though straight to begin with, hit the fairway and rolled off to the right near the woods. Disappointed with the result, he was searching for his ball near some bushes when he heard a strange sound coming from the underbrush, but chose to ignore it.

After locating his ball near the base of a tree, he lined up to examine the best possible angle for his shot when, again, he heard the sound and, out of the corner of his eye, saw some movement in the bushes. Looking up he spotted what he later described as one of the biggest wild turkeys he’d ever seen. “Holy cow! That’s one big bird!” he heard his companions exclaim from some 30 yards away.

Without taking his eyes off the turkey, Jay began to back off slowly. The bird took this as a signal to advance­slowly. My husband moved slightly to the left. The bird mirrored his movement. Jay stepped to the right. The turkey did the same. Then, without warning, the turkey took flight directly at Jay’s face. As he fell flat on his back, he remembered thinking, “Turkeys don’t attack people.”

Scrambling quickly to his feet he began to “dance” with the bird while holding his nine iron out in front of him to keep the bird at bay. They made a full 360-degree turn before the turkey retreated to the woods. The other golfers rushed in, incredulous.

Jay pulled himself together and set up, once again, to take his shot. “Hold on, Jay,” one of the guys said. “It’s coming at you again.”

Sure enough, the turkey wasn’t finished. Poking its head out of the tall grass, it glared at the players and flapped its wings as warning, then retreated after having the last word.

“Just take the shot, Jay. I got your back,” one of the guys said, placing himself between my husband and the woods. Jay duffed the shot but got it far enough away to feel safe from attack, and so the round continued.

Throughout the next eight holes the conversation rarely deviated from “turkey talk” and how bizarre the incident had been. Speculation as to why a normally shy bird would do such a thing ranged from thinking that it must have been a female protecting her family, to maybe it was simply nuts.

When we first moved to New Hampshire the natives told us we’d be lucky to ever see a wild turkey, and we found that to be true. As the years passed however, we’ve seen more and more of them, and now they strut through our yard on a regular basis.

Speaking with N.H. Fish and Game wildlife biologist Ted Walski, I learned why: Wild turkeys became extinct in New Hampshire in the mid 1850s due to habitat loss and over-hunting. But the department began restocking them in the 1970s, and the wild turkey population has expanded to around 35,000 statewide.

According to Walski, sometimes Tom turkeys will get into breeding mode during mating season and “forget themselves,” attacking a human­especially if the person is wearing bright colors. The hen turkeys will protect their young from anyone who gets too close.

After looking at a drawing of a hen and tom turkey, my husband said the turkey that flew at him was probably a female. So perhaps the lesson here is to keep your distance from turkeys, especially in the spring, when the birds are mating, nesting, and rearing young.

The day after the golf incident I was awakened at 5 a.m. by a loud gobbling outside and went to the window to see what the noise was about. There, strolling down our street was a huge Tom turkey, gobbling nonstop in full voice to the female turkey in front of him.

Another state wildlife biologist told my editor that the “turkey talk” was just the tom trying to persuade the female to mate with him. “That’s pretty much all they do,” the biologist said. “After the mating season, Tom Turkey retires to the couch with a beer to watch the ballgame and leaves the rest of the work­incubating the eggs and raising the young­to the hens.”

By Susan Ferber, Master Gardener
UNH Cooperative Extension

The average person would probably identify the blue jay as the most curious of birds, but I would cast my vote for the crow. Most people who live in rural areas would agree with me because they, like me, have had opportunities to view the crow up close. Let me relate why I favor the big, black bird.

Growing up in Kansas, I used to have to shoo crows away from the corn and strawberry fields. Not only are crows curious, they are also very obstinate. We tried all sorts of devices to keep them away from the crops. Aluminum pie plates, an occasional blast from a shotgun, and of course running around waving our arms in the air and shouting.

It worked for about five minutes. You could tell the crows had a sense of humor by listening to their seemingly defiant cawing. They’d go off in a tree and face us as a group of a dozen or so, drop their voices about half an octave and draw it out longer than normal.

More recently and here in New Hampshire, I've once again been required to match wits with this wily bird. Every evening while my house was being built, I’d come to the property to see what progress had been made during that day.

On the perimeter of the lot there were some large pines. As I parked my car, I’d be greeted by a chorus of caws. The crows didn't fly away in fright, but instead asserted their territorial rights. If I stayed too long, they would elect a scout to come down and stroll, at a safe distance, recording whatever I was doing to report back to those in the trees. I could hear the crows in the trees in heated discussion, or so it seemed, about how safe it was for one of their number to be strolling around just out of reach of the human intruder.

As I returned to my car, the crow conversation seemed to lose some of its intensity as the elected scout rejoined the group. As I got ready to drive away, they joined a larger flock to fly to their nighttime location.

Those of us who observe crows know that not only are they extremely curious, cooperative and intelligent, they’re thieves and scavengers. The builder had a backhoe parked on the property while construction was in progress. One morning he came to the property and saw a large crow on the hood of his machine. As he approached he noticed the crow had something in its mouth. Upon further inspection, the builder discovered the crow had what remained of the wiper blade for the machine. When the crow felt his act of defiance was sufficient, it flew away with the wiper blade still in its beak.

My father related an experience he'd had when he was a youth. He and his brother were trying to keep crows off a field of corn by removing and destroying their nest in a tall cedar near the field. They found the nest contained two rings, a dime, three bright-colored shoe strings and a piece of broken mirror.

There are some benefits to having crows around. (I draw the line at calling them friends, however.) They keep small rodents on constant high alert. Chipmunks, voles, ground squirrels and mice are articles of diet for crows as well as other birds of prey.

I have observed crows’ group hunting techniques a couple of times in my back yard. They fly in quietly in a group of six or eight. They disperse themselves around the perimeter of an open area, staying in the treetops. When the prey animal appears, they allow it to get well away from its bolt-hole and then dive on it, playing out the attack with precision. Each crow knows what section of the circle is his and is prepared to kill or maim. I have never figured out how they divide their spoils.

I've never seen them attack songbirds, but I have witnessed crows diving on an eagle, some red-tailed hawks, and blue jays. They also dislike cats. In these cases, I don't think they are attacking to kill; they just don't want raptors, jays, or cats near what they consider their territory.

If you are observant, you may discover other things about the crow. For instance, they gather in large numbers in the evening and spend the night roosting, with guard crows on the perimeter, alert for danger.

They have a strong self-preservation instinct and will be one of the last birds to be in danger of extinction. So we humans might as well get used to living with this curious and fascinating bird.

By: Bill Dawson, Community Tree Steward

Like most New Hampshire folks, I’d been looking for a first sign of spring something significant and spectacular to symbolize the change of seasons. For the past few years I marked the long awaited arrival of spring with the happy sighting of early bluebirds, often in a late snow.

But no bluebirds yet. I did scare a few ducks in some open water on the frozen pond the other day, but they were gone before I could really enjoy them.

Unexpectedly, early one morning when I was out jogging, I literally stumbled on a ruffed grouse. This determined bird was pecking at dried leaves along the edge of the road perhaps for salt? I was within four feet of the busy creature, who was totally oblivious or unafraid of me.

What an elegant, beautiful bird with such complex and intricate plumage. So many different kinds of feathers no wonder ladies of 100 years ago wore feathered hats. The sophisticated coloring blended exactly with the dried leaves and debris of the forest floor that was emerging from the melting snow.

I inspected the beautiful feather designs: its breast was checkered with fluffy white and dark feathers alternating, creating an interesting geometric pattern. Above these soft looking feathers were some sharply outlined bars on its wings. Its back was polka dotted in shades of chestnut and tan.

Its foot long body was very round, and after looking at pictures of ruffed grouse, I now realize that was because its plumage was puffed up. The black disk around its neck was very noticeable, and arrayed on top of this disk were a row of lighter feathers that created a scalloped edge, like a ruffle. (For those of us who thought it was a “ruffled grouse,” we weren’t entirely wrong!)

A sharp crest, taller at the back, tops its brown head. At the other end is the blunt tail of beautiful feathers with a black band at the edge. The tail was half fanned so I could admire the lovely striped feathers. I stood in amazement as the grouse continued to peck, even as I took a few quiet steps.

The owner of the house behind the trees saw me from his upstairs window and opened it to inform me that Mr. Grouse showed up a few days ago near his backyard bird feeder and had been hanging around ever since. (Wildlife manuals say that male and female grouse are difficult to tell apart, but seeing that half fanned tail reminded me of the fanning displays ruffed grouse males make during courtship, so I pegged him as a Mr.)

Three days later, a drum roll spring event! As I began my morning outing, I was greeted with noisy quacking in the pond around the corner a pair of ducks, the quacker and a serene female. Continuing up the road to another pond, I heard more quacks.

But what was that black cat like creature crossing the road? Too huge for a cat, and the big fluffy long tail was definitely not like a cat’s, nor the pointed snout like a cat’s cute face. A fisher! It must have alarmed the ducks, but not enough to make them fly away. Now a new worry popped into my head fishers getting into the duck eggs. So much for the peacefulness of nature.

Looping back along the road through the swampy area, again, I almost stepped on my new friend, Mr. Grouse. Looking sleeker today, as his feathers weren’t puffed up, nor his tail fanned, he blended right into the leaf litter.

I studied the grouse in wonder. Does he know I’m watching? He pecked right up to me; just five feet, then feet away. He circled my legs. I observed the feathers again, noticing how they resemble in color and pattern the pine cones lying about. I'd missed the light colored stripe on each side of its back the other day.

I took a few stealthy steps and the bird seemed to be heading in the same direction along the road. Was he actually following me? I continued slowly and so did he, as if I had a string around his neck.

He pecked at everything, finding a fat green leaf under the litter that he plucked out with his beak and swallowed whole, along with the bits of acorns and pine nuts. We went along like this for a couple hundred yards, until I gave up and left him behind to wander into the nearby swamp.

Ruffed grouse are supposed to be loners, but this Mr. Grouse seemed especially lonely! According to the books, mating season is in April.  I hope this poor fellow can last that long. And I hope that fisher finds something better to do than eat duck eggs.

By Anne Krantz, Master Gardener and Community Tree Steward

Photo Courtesy of Laura Erickson and Audobon.org (Common Birds in Decline)

I found it! For years, I've been searching every woodpecker hole in every dead or live tree I could reach. All the books say that many birds use woodpecker holes for nesting sites, but I'd never found a nest in a hole.

I've seen many nests built in crotches of trees, including one I noticed only because a brilliant male scarlet tanager flew right in front of me and up into the nest to feed his young. I've seen nests in bird houses I've put out and robins' nests on the jut-out of the dining-room bay window under the shelter of the porch roof.

The phoebes also like the tops of our outside spotlights and frequently nest there. Once I found the nest of a northern Baltimore oriole out in the middle of the swamp. But a nest in a tree hollow carved out by woodpeckers? No, never. Until yesterday.

Each fresh coat of snow for snowshoeing and cross-country skiing means hours of clearing. By the time I've shoveled the paths to the woodpile and bird feeders, cleared the decks and porch, created paths for my little dogs, and pulled snow off the porch roof, I'm too tired to get out there and enjoy the snow.

Yesterday, however, I stole some time. I'd donned snowshoes to get behind the woodpile to clear snow off the back. So when I finished, I headed out into the woods. They were so lovely still, and peaceful, the snow clinging to many branches. I could walk everywhere since the fallen trees, small boulders, stone walls, and low shrubs were covered in snow.

I followed a path made by a deer, trekking over to a large, dead tree to check it out. This tree must have been a monster in life. It had at least four trunks, one which showed signs of someone attempting to cut it with a saw 10 feet above the ground. One of the trunks lay buried under the snow. The bark was gone, and I could see many tunnels made by grubs and holes made by woodpeckers. I searched carefully, but no sign of a nest.

Out onto the swamp I went. On my last visit, I'd noticed an odd hole, with dirty footprints all around it but none leading to or away from it. Some creature must have come up from under the snow, looked around, and headed back inside. The most recent snowfall, however, had left only a small opening under a dead tree.

Up above, the five heron nests, piled high with snow, stood out starkly from their tree supports. I hope that somewhere down south the heron pairs and their 14 young are feeding well and enjoying the warmth and sunshine. Next month, the first arrivals should be here, scouting out the territory and choosing the best nest site. I'm glad these nests are all still intact. A few additional branches to refurbish and they'll be all set for a new crop of squabbling youngsters.

A hairy woodpecker flew nearby and began working on a tree. Bits of bark and wood flew out and fell onto the snow below. The dead evergreens seemed almost alive again with green moss hanging from each branch. I love to look at the dead trunks. Stripped now of bark, they reveal the twists and turns each tree made as it reached for the sun, shifted slightly to one side to grow around another, repaired the damage from a broken limb. One tree in particular was covered with knobs formed when the tree grew out over a stub. Little insect holes filled the trunk as well as one or two larger ones made by the birds.

I moved to a new area and noticed a broad snag about eight feet tall. The lower portion was nearly hollow and above, at eye level, was a large hole clearly bored by a woodpecker. I peeked inside and there it was, a beautiful bird's nest.

Snow had filled the nest's cavity so I carefully removed it to see the construction of the nest itself. Dried mud and grasses formed a perfect circle. The inside was as smooth as a carefully turned and sanded wooden bowl. The nest was large, at least as large as the ones the robins build above our window. The birds had carefully selected an opening which faced east, avoiding both the heat of the summer sun and the winds from the north and west. Perfect.

I noted the location of that tree. In the spring and summer, I won't be able to see the opening from the shore, but I'll be able to watch for adult birds flying in and out of the nest. I'm curious to know what species built the nest. Now that I've found it, I'm going to enjoy it.

By Susan M. Poirier, Master Gardener

Drawing: Pamela Doherty, UNH Cooperative Extension

Whenever my husband and I walk together in the woods, he is looking up and I am looking down. Up because he is thinking about his woodlands: which trees need thinning, which need to be allowed more light; down, because I am looking for anything that might grow on the forest floor: wildflowers, mosses, lichens, mushrooms, rocks.

Looking down keeps me from catching my toes on surface roots and fallen branches. (My husband is much more sure-footed than I.) But I have decided to look up more often. There’s so much to see­clouds, sky, the stars, bats and birds­that require leaning back and looking up.

In winter, cloud action has a different energy from that of summer; look up and you will see. The wind in the earth’s troposphere can be quite severe, and when it is, "lenticular" clouds appear more often. These clouds are lens-shaped, concave and smooth with curved tops like a lens. They occur more frequently over tall mountains and out west, but do happen here, just not as often.

One day a few weeks ago, I watched as three lenticular clouds became thinner and more stretched out over the course of 90 minutes. How long they had been there I didn’t know, but they are known to last quite awhile due to their location in the upper atmosphere and strong, circulating winds that swirl around mountain tops.

The smooth, rounded shapes may even pile neatly, one on top of another, making layered lentil-shaped clouds. Add a touch of color as occurs sometimes due to light and dust in the air, and…magic! Going back to my high school meteorology lessons, the more frequent denizens of the sky are delightful also, a sky full of mackerel cirrus or pink cumulus clouds make any day better. Look up.

Last September, in that too-brief time when summer-like conditions returned, I witnessed a spectacular sight that was seen all up and down the Asquamchumakee or Baker River Valley just south of the White Mountains.

Planting bulbs with my back to the sky and Carr Mountain, a light shower began just as the sun was setting in the west. I moved under an ancient apple tree waiting for the rain to pass. Thunder rumbled in the distance, but sunlight continued to spill over the low mountains to our west.

Suddenly, a rainbow began to appear in the northern sky, first faint and then full strength color arcing across the horizon. I dashed for my camera and got some great shots. At times it was a double rainbow and lasted much longer than usual. The combination of water droplets and sunlight at a low angle made for an amazingly bright and vivid rainbow.
The immediacy and rarity of such a sight left me feeling as though I alone had viewed it. Later, in speaking with others from up and down our valley, I was amazed to discover that many had shared my experience across at least three towns. Now, I was not alone but a member of a special club. Good thing I looked up, or I would’ve missed it all.

Looking up can also reap views of intrigue and adventure in the bird world. While looking up the other day I was fortunate enough to see a light-colored hawk being chased by several crows. The insouciance of the hawk with its mocking, leisurely glide and the raucousness of the harpy-like crows made me laugh out loud.

Later, studying some field guides to the birds, a northern goshawk seemed the likely upstart I would not have seen if I hadn’t looked...up.

Last winter, while filling a bird feeder I heard a slight noise from above, and when I looked up there sat a barred owl in broad daylight and in all of its feathery glory. I watched it for more than an hour from the relative warmth of my shed door as it waited patiently for mice and other prey. When it dove, it did so with a sureness and speed I wouldn’t have imagined. And, when it ascended to its perch, a tail dangled from its mouth. Breathtaking! Look up.

Sometimes, the reminder to look up comes from the source of wonder itself. While I was loading the birdfeeders again, a hairy woodpecker skimmed the top of my head as it dove from one tree to a nearby bush to feed on suet. I still remember with a shiver down my back the thrum of his wings, and the swoosh! of skimming feathers. Whether or not he meant to “buzz” my head, I felt as though he did mean his warning peek! for me and me alone! Translation: Look up!

Communing with nature resonates throughout our lives and enhances our days on this earth. That special connection to nature reminds us as humans we aren’t alone on our planet and in our natural environment. To reaffirm this, I’ll continue looking down but also occasionally remind myself to look up.

By Helen Downing, Master Gardener

The Toad perched on my birdfeeder in early February, his beak in the air, eyeing the mealworms I put out every day for the bluebirds, was actually a robin. I called him Toad because he stood there giving me the quiet stare of a toad.

The robin is the first sign of spring, but it certainly wasn't spring. I didn't realize this robin sighting was going to turn into a confrontation. Sure he'd eat from the feeders, I figured, probably go for the suet. But before he left, we had quite a skirmish, and that robin learned to count to three.

Our first encounter happened as I was sitting in my observation chair on a snowy day, surrounded by bird books and needlepoint watching the large flocks of pine siskins and counting the adorable bluebirds posed on the mealworm station. Swoosh, chirp, chirp, chirp, and Toad had scared away the bluebirds and was sitting on the edge of the dish with three mealworms in his beak.

"Oh, this could be a problem! But maybe he'll go away," I thought. But another swoosh and he was at it again. My first concern was that he might stay all winter and it was only February. At the rate he ate mealworms, I'd have to use our 401k to feed both him and the blues. Anxiety was taking over. I was going to have to come up with a plan to get this bird to move on.

Possible solutions ran through my brain. Could I screen him out? (But how would the bluebirds eat?) Maybe lure the blues to the back of the house with another mealworm station? (Not sure they would find it.)Try to feed each species at different times of the day? (Birds can't tell time.) I was getting desperate as days went by and Toad kept making his attacks.

When all seemed to be lost, it dawned on me: Maybe I could train him to take only a few and then leave.
I knew he could see me in the window, as he had tried several times to stare me down. (He usually blinked first.) What if I could get him to count to three, the number of worms I'd allow him to take at any single swoosh? Worth a try.

First attempt, Toad came to the feeding station, perched on the edge and looked at me. He took one worm, paused, and looked at me. He did it again with a little more confidence, still giving me the eye. One more attempt, and I jumped at him waving my arms. He flew off.

Within five minutes he was back again, looking for me in the window. I was there. He moved in for the first mealworm and paused back on the edge. The second attempt went well, but with the third he took the mealworm, looked at me, and before I could yell, he was gone.

The next day dawned cold and clear. I heard his chirp, chirp, before 6 a.m. Not yet ready for battle, I snoozed until 8, knowing there weren't any mealworms in the dish. At 8, I put out 20. Toad had been eyeing me from the gutter, appearing to casually admire the view while secretly making plans for his next meal. Swoosh, there he was. He made his first attempt, then confidently caught his second and third. With the third in his beak, though, he didn't leave, just sat there looking at me. When he moved in for a fourth, I yelled! Stunned, he took off.

Well, Toad was smart but not as smart as I was. He figured out when there was no one in the window, it was open season-push out the bluebirds and party on. I decided to slow down his gorging by propping something human-like in my chair. Out came an old three-foot-tall stuffed doll that had belonged to my daughter.

While the doll didn't have my personality, she did fill the chair, giving a fairly good impression. Now the acid test: Will she scare off Toad?

For the next two days, the doll worked pretty well. Toad took his three mealworms, and I didn't have to yell at him. We even got into counting together, one and he looked up, two and he looked up, and three and he took off.

Wow! Maybe this was going to work. The doll in my chair slowed down the decimation of mealworms, and Toad had learned to count. For now, we'd struck a detente.

Unfortunately, Toad figured out the doll trick, and I was back to square one. What was I going to do now? I didn't have to come up with a new strategy.

Toad suddenly disappeared. He simply vanished. No more chirp, chirp. Gone. I must say I was a little hurt. Why would any bird leave such a choice location? But the blues were back and everything returned to normal.

By Suzy Martin, Master Gardener

I’d finished brushing my teeth. Glancing out the bathroom window I saw it a magnificent bird of prey, perched quietly on a tall tree at the edge of the woods. I keep a pair of binoculars at the ready for just such sightings they came in handy now. Oh, what a grand creature!

When it turned its head slightly to follow the path of a blue jay, a dark streak above the eye showed clearly. The breast and tail were light; what I could see of the sides of the body appeared gray. Most of the legs were covered by feathers as the bird sat in the bright sunshine of a bitter cold day. I hoped these markings would be enough for me to identify the bird. For now, I was just enjoying the sight of it.

The blue jay wasn’t alone in keeping tabs on the predator. A second jay was cawing from a nearby tree. The first one sat for a while, cocking its head at the much larger bird, then flew right in front of it to another tree. After a while, it flew back, again, directly in the line of vision of the hulking light gray ghost. Clearly, the jays wanted to harass the hawk, but it refused to rise to the bait.

Meanwhile, all around were goldfinches, chickadees and titmice. They appeared totally unconcerned about the sharp talons and ripping beak poised not far above them. They continued feeding at my many feeders, arguing among themselves, and moving rapidly from one feeder to another. A chickadee or titmouse would grab a sunflower heart then fly off to a tree to feed. The finches jostled one another then suddenly flew off to sit atop the tall fir near the house. There half a dozen swirled around, startling each other off branches before the entire lot returned to the feeders. Clearly they didn’t see themselves as brunch.

Indeed, they were so small that each one could serve only as an hors d’oeuvre to the larger bird. It would take more than a couple of finches to fill that stomach. Suddenly, a movement low to the ground caught my eye. A gray squirrel was cautiously moving down the trunk of a fir. The mammal was in the shadow, with the trunk of the tree between it and the hawk. I doubted that even the clear eye of the predator could see this movement. The gray shadow quickly hopped across the snow and under the low, spreading branches of another fir. There it could wait out the threat in safety.

Our house sits in an ideal spot for wildlife watching. The area immediately around it has been minimally cleared some tall trees removed for safety and sunshine in the front­but we’ve left or planted many shrubs with pathways of growth leading into the surrounding woods. Below, to the northeast, is a beaver impoundment home to herons, snapping turtles and many birds, as well as the beaver families who maintain two dams and several lodges. Visitors include otter, deer, bear, moose, fox and bobcat. The interaction and antics of the animals have provided us with many hours of pleasure.

The pleasure of this visit continued. After watching for a while, I ran into the next room and grabbed the camera. Snap! Got it! Yet the bird seemed content to stay for a while longer, so I quickly dashed to the camera bag and swapped lenses the zoom would really bring it in and allow me a better opportunity for identification.

For the next 10 minutes, I snapped and watched. The jays continued their mildly annoying tactics. Finally, the hawk had had enough. As I watched, it spread its wings, pushed off from the branch while adroitly turning 180 degrees, then flew off into the woods, threading its way between the branches as easily as I stitch together a seam. The jays discontinued their vigil and joined the small songbirds at the feeders below.

The pictures I’d taken were clear. The bird did indeed have a blackish crown and cheek with a clear white stripe over the eye. Based on the known size of the nearby blue jay, we estimated the predator’s length as two feet or more. Its light breast and gray back indicate it had to be a northern goshawk. A giant compared to the tiny chickadees and finches, it appeared regal and august as it sat above them, surveying the domain.

I hope I see it again soon.

By Susan M. Poirier, Master Gardener

Glancing out of my observation window in the living room, I saw a grey ball of feathers looking somewhat like a tufted titmouse, but this one had no tufts. The tiny bird had flattened his tufts, making himself as small as he could by hunkering down next to a branch on the lilac near my window. His eyes were as big as saucers; dark round pools of fear looking straight up at the sky.

Looking out the window I saw that Stumpy, the Eastern grey squirrel who lives in my backyard feasting on the remains of the feed from the birdfeeders, was also frozen in his tracks near the bird feeder, looking straight up. Hmmm, what’s up here? There was no one at the bird feeder; no sounds of goldfinches squabbling as they usually do or woodpeckers zipping in and out.

Living in a rural/suburban New Hampshire border town, I had never witnessed such behavior at my bird feeders. My birds fly in and out like most seed-loving birds, fight over the best spot, and in general have a good time. At night, I might have the occasional skunk or raccoon digging around my foundation for grubs or a deer or two munching on the hostas. That’s about all the wildlife I see, unless you count the turkeys and doves and the invasion of chipmunks that everyone has. But this behavior was different.

Gladly dropping what I was doing, I picked up my camera and headed for the screened porch, quietly watching the little titmouse wishing he were the size of a walking stick. I think if I’d tried to pry him lose he wouldn’t have let go.

Scanning the nearby trees, I saw it­a hawk, looking cool and confident of his next meal, perched on the branch at attention, slowing turning his head to take in the view. My camera in hand, set on continuous shutter speed, I found him in my screen and started shooting. Click, click, click. I must have gotten 30 exposures before he took off.

Looking around again for him, I saw him swoop, and Bam! Yellow, black, and white feathers drifted down from near the birdfeeder as he flew upward, the tiny body of an unlucky goldfinch hanging from his beak. Stumpy was still flat on the ground with one eye towards the sky and the titmouse was still holding fast to his branch.  The fear in the body of the titmouse told its story. The appearance of a hawk shadow causes these precious little birds to hide with fear and exhibit abnormal behaviors such as allowing me to photograph him so close, when he would have normally flown at the mere sound of the sliding door opening.

So who was the guy terrorizing my feeding station? From the field guide and my digital photos, a Cooper’s hawk, a small 14-inch by 20-inch, with a tail rounded at the tip. But what was he doing here in my suburban backyard? In the 10 years we've lived here, I’ve never seen a hawk, and according to the guide these hawks prefer deciduous forest near open fields for their hunting grounds, not backyards.

Reading further, I learned that some Cooper’s hawks have discovered the backyard bird feeder as a hawk supermarket.
But the fear Stumpy displayed puzzled me, as he looked to me to be too big for a small Cooper’s hawk to even think about having for dinner, especially since Cooper’s hawks aren’t normally found in suburban areas where a lot of squirrels dine at bird feeders.  Reading further, it appears small mammals are also on their menu as hawks with sharp beaks tear the flesh of their prey rather than gulping it whole like owls, making any live animal they can carry fair game.

After the attack and the settling of the feathers, the titmouse slowly turned his head to survey the trees, released his vise-grip on the tree branch, shivered as if he had dodged a bullet, and flew away to live another day. Stumpy, not as alarmed by the Cooper’s Hawk as the titmouse, straightened himself out, scratched his fur and starting looking for more leftover bird seed. Gradually the squabbling goldfinches came back, as did the woodpeckers and chickadees. Bird life was back to normal.

By Suzy Martin, Master Gardener

Seeing a “new” bird or animal is an unexpected thrill. We have enjoyed two new bird sightings already this summer.

The first sighting happened recently in Franconia, when an unusual mewing sound caught our attention. The mewing turned out to be birds!

A woodpecker like bird was scampering up and down a white birch tree next to the high deck, just six feet away. Its coloring differed from that of hairy or downy woodpeckers. A quick check in our bird book confirmed we were observing a yellow bellied sapsucker, a member of the woodpecker family.

The sapsucker was industriously drilling rows of holes to get the sweet birch sap. Later we saw several more drilling away. These two had no red markings on their heads and speckled buff breasts the markings of juveniles. They had already learned to drill for food and were happily sucking out the birch sap.

Next we noticed bees flying about. They were obviously attracted to the sweet sap, too. And could it be? Yes, a humming bird! What a fabulous example of the interdependence of the flora and fauna of nature a little ecosystem right in front of our eyes, like a TV screen, but real. Watching this intertwined ecosystem reminded me of a favorite paperback book, Forest and Thicket, Trees, Shrubs and Wildflowers of Eastern North America, by John Eastman, with beautiful drawings by Amelia Hansen. Eastman not only describes a tree or plant, but gives its “lifestyle.” For white birch he notes that it “does not thrive where average July temperatures exceed 70 degrees Fahrenheit.” He also relates fascinating information about each plant’s “associates” and “lore.”

Eastman confirmed our amazing sighting in his chapter about white birch trees: “[A] pitted area of holes drilled in regular horizontal rows, usually fairly high on the tree, indicates the feeding site of the yellow bellied sapsucker. After drilling the holes, the sapsucker returns at intervals to lick up the exuded sap and any insects attracted to the flow. The ruby throated hummingbird is a secondary feeder. Though not the only tree ‘tapped’ by sapsuckers, white birch is a favorite.” I was curious to know more about sapsuckers. I discovered they breed north of the Nashua Manchester line here in New Hampshire. They like to nest in second growth woods.

White birch and aspen are tree species that sprout first in a cut forest, because they thrive in full sun. Sapsuckers like these pioneer tree species, but they need the older trees that are beginning to decline and have rotten centers. They excavate or dig out the punky centers for hidden and well protected nest sites. Obviously pecking holes in trees is the woodpecker’s unique adaptation. Woodpeckers may use the same tree for several years, but they excavate new nest cavities each year. They usually rear a clutch of five or six, incubating the eggs for 12 to 13 days and nesting for 24 and 26 days. In addition to sucking sap, they eat inner bark, insects, and fruits and berries. Our second “new” bird nested in the shrubbery next to our house in Amherst. Wood thrushes made a nest at the top of an overgrown lilac under our bedroom window.

We were alerted to the nesting activity by the lovely, flute like song of the thrushes. They started singing at sunrise, giving us a melodious alarm clock for a week or so. Then they moved on to other behavior that didn’t require singing perhaps incubation is quiet time.

Soon there were babies in the nest I could barely see by peeking through the dense cover of leaves. With the continuous rain this summer, the roof of leaves proved strategic. In early July we finally had a sunny Saturday. Not only were baby swallows fledging from their nest in the box in the garden, but we also heard lots of commotion near the thrush nest. A baby thrush was perched on a branch near the nest making a loud racket. Mother thrush paid no attention to the little ball of fluff, which eventually figured out how to flap its wings in the damp air. I didn’t pay enough attention either. Soon it was gone along with its mother, and the nest was empty.

I’ve just learned that bird nests next to houses are a bad idea because of bird mites. The life cycle of the mites coincides with the nesting schedule, and the mite population can explode just as the birds leave. With the birds gone, the mites can invade a home and bite humans to test them as potential hosts.

So I will cut back my lilac tree to shrub size to eliminate the perfect nesting site. The thrushes will find another location nearby, although maybe not so perfect for bird watching.

By Anne Krantz, Master Gardener and Tree Steward

My jaw dropped the first time I saw an Eastern Bluebird. Wow! The male boasts an iridescent royal blue unlike anything else in nature. Many backyard birdwatchers, myself included, are rendered inarticulate whenever one comes into view.

I’m fortunate enough to have an occupied Audubon Eastern Bluebird nesting box. Since last year when the bluebird couple set up housekeeping in the box, I’ve become obsessed with watching their every move.

Each time I walk past a window or glass door, I pause to see what’s happening at the box. Are the birds perched on top, clinging to the side and peering in, or out of view? My obsession, fueled by the birds’ spectacular appearance, has matured into respect for their parenting style and admiration of their playful family traditions.

Last spring after the birds built a nest in the box, they waited patiently until the New Hampshire weather was warm enough for the female to lay her eggs. Each day at sundown, one of them would bed down with the clutch to keep the eggs warm and safe through the night. During daylight the pair lingered nearby to keep watch, dive bombing those they viewed as threats, such as Grey Squirrels, Blue Jays and Brown headed Cowbirds. Amazingly, they would allow Chipping and Tree Sparrows to rest on top of their box without a second glance.

Through either intuition or learning, the pair also knew they could trust me to inspect their box. And perhaps because my Labradors are ever present, the birds tolerated the dogs as they ran, played and barked only feet from the nesting box. Even after my male yellow Lab marked the nesting box post, the birds carried on with their business without a pause. With this risk management policy in place, the pair raised three healthy broods last summer.

After each clutch hatched, I watched as the real work began for the pair. Both the male and the female bluebird were busy gobbling up worms and insects and returning to the box with a high protein meal for the hatchlings. Sometimes, the father or the mother sat on top of the box, waiting for its mate to exit after completing a feeding session. This alternating method seemed necessary to feed the youngsters.

The hatchlings fledged from their box when they reached approximately 20 days old. One morning last June I witnessed one of the hatchlings fledge. Its panic was apparent: it flapped its wings hard and fast but it wasn’t getting far, reminding me of a single engine plane barely keeping out of a tailspin.

So, when I read that bluebirds don’t return to the nest they were born in, I wasn’t surprised. They don’t appear to have the flying skills necessary to get through the nesting box hole. When they first emerged from their nesting box, the juveniles were a dull blue and their reddish brown breasts mottled with buff color. They were round and fat, not at all like sleek adult bluebirds. I estimated that each day a bird would fledge until the box was empty. It was then that I removed the old nesting material from the box and swept it clean.

For a week or so after they left the box, the juveniles waited in trees for their parents to bring them food. But the parents knew it was time for their offspring to feed themselves. There was no parental angst about their babies’ sudden independence and maturity. The elder birds let the young fend for themselves and occupied their time building a fresh nest in the now empty box. 

As the bluebird parents cared for their next brood, the juveniles remained close. Sometimes they jockeyed for position on top of the box to watch the parental feeding parade. The temptation to peer inside was overwhelming for the young bluebirds, especially during a commotion for food or a skirmish over space in the nest.

When they were not loitering by the nesting box, the birds were exploring their surroundings in a large troop. They were like the Von Trapp Family Singers: eating, chirping, and traveling with a sense of urgency and danger at every stop. And the singing group expanded after the second clutch fledged, and again when the third clutch fledged. By Labor Day there were 12 juvenile bluebirds following their parents from tree to tree, from fence to fence.

Just when I figured the bluebird parents reached exhaustion from their summer of reproductive success, they disappeared. The family had moved on together. 

This year, on the last day of February, a pair of bluebirds appeared in our backyard. Although I can’t say for sure whether they are the same couple from last year, the way they knew their way around the nesting box made me think they are.

By Donna Jensen, Master Gardener and Community Tree Steward

The Upper Meadow slopes from a row of young pines down toward the cattails at the edge of our pond. An overgrown field dotted with pines, birches, apple trees and alder clumps, the Upper Meadow attracts all of the usual and many of the unusual suspects of New Hampshire wildlife.

Deer and moose follow my trails through the goldenrod and meadowsweet, while snowshoe hare traipse along their lower-level network through the brambles and brush that protect them from hawks and coyotes. In the winter, a weasel or a fisher may drop in, meandering in and out of the thickets and hedges in search of a mouse or a vole.

In the spring, toads and tree frogs approach the pond, their trilling a bit louder and more concentrated for several days until they finally reach the water for a day or two of wild partying. In late June, spring peepers and lightning bugs stage their sound and light show, tiny fireworks sparkling over the meadow accompanied by the continuous chorus of the frogs.

For most visitors, the Upper Meadow offers a pleasant place to spend a few minutes, whether looking for tracks in the snow or spotting dragon flies hunting along the trails. However, for those in the know, the Upper Meadow demands a visit in early spring when the woodcock return.

Our neighbors were definitely in the know. Immediately after introducing themselves on the day we moved in, they interrogated us concerning our intentions for the field. Satisfying themselves that we liked the goldenrod and the asters and were not about to subdivide or construct any monstrous outbuildings, they confessed they had feared we would interfere with the woodcock mating ritual. This comment sounded rather bizarre to a pair of urban dwellers, but we simply assumed (not incorrectly) that we had fallen in among some eccentric nature lovers. Still among the uninitiated, we didn’t comprehend the allure of the woodcock.

The following spring, during maple-sugaring season, tiny pine trees finally emerged from the melting snow, and flattened openings appeared here and there across the meadow. Unbeknownst to us, this battered, drab, damp landscape represented romance­a veritable Waikiki Beach­to the lonely woodcock.

One evening, just at dusk, our neighbors stopped by, all excited.

“Have you heard the woodcock?”

“No,” I answered, betraying my total ignorance by adding “What do they sound like?”

“What! You’ve never heard them? You must come out right now!”

So we did. And we heard the calls: “Peeent... Peeent...Peeent.” The woodcock males, possibly deranged by their long migration, apparently thought this monotonous, atonal, unmistakable call-far closer to a door buzzer than to Frank Sinatra-would somehow entrance the loveliest and most feminine of their species.

But perhaps this call really was like a doorbell, while the romantic appeal was in the woodcock’s bursting out of the clearing, flying out low over the tree line, then circling ever higher over the meadow, emitting a mysterious and plausibly romantic whinny, audible as it circled and eventually fluttered back to the initial clearing.

The hopeful male repeated this intriguing display again and again, for more than an hour. Finally we returned to the house, at last understanding our neighbors’ concerns about preserving the field we had eventually christened the Upper Meadow.

Since that first spring, we eagerly await the return of the woodcock. The mating ritual begins as soon as there is some bare ground in late March or early April, and it may continue into May.

It is easy to observe the display; if you stand motionless, you don’t disrupt the romance. Since the males tend to flutter back to almost the same spot, you can move up to a bush or young pine and get within 20 feet of the bird, close enough to hear the soft “coos” between his “peeents,” and close enough to see him turn, walk a step or two, and send his plaintive call out in a different direction.

I have often observed the display, usually staying until it is too dark to see anything. I have counted the “peents,” sometimes fewer than 10 and sometimes more than 40 before the male takes off. In late summer, I have also seen many a happy family of woodcocks, so I know some sort of mating eventually does occur. However, I remain puzzled by the effort the allegedly lovelorn males expend in these elaborate, endlessly repeated displays. While wildlife biologists assure me that well-hidden female woodcock observe the ritual, presumably with great interest, I have only ever seen the males.
While the charade may continue past midnight, no guests ever show up, the party never starts, and-in my experience-they never get their girl.

By Carl D. Martland, Coverts Cooperator

Yesterday, the old wooden bench was still covered by snow from last week’s storm, its location found only by memory. Today, the entire top of the back is visible. Today also, the first stones of the vegetable garden’s raised bed have begun to peek out through the snow. I know that once the first stones are visible, they’ll absorb the sun’s warmth and the melting will accelerate. Soon, the entire south face will appear, as if by magic.

The metal roof of the three-season room resounds to the dripping of the melting snow off the back roof of the house. It sounds like rain and makes talking impossible. Each morning, the dogs wake a bit earlier, aroused by the sun leaking through the bedroom shades. In the evening, we leave the dining room windows uncovered while we eat. To watch the daylight as it lingers longer and longer is such a delight. We don’t need a calendar to know that spring is coming.

Last night, we left the wood stove empty. The day had been so warm we didn’t need to build a fire to heat the house. The room itself was empty as we all moved off to other rooms, no longer drawn by the heat and dancing flames. In the bitterest cold of winter, we seem to live in that one room. All the others feel cold by comparison. Last night, all were equally comfortable so we strayed to occupations in other areas.

The ski shop in town sends out emails starting with, “Spring skiing!” My friends and I find ourselves shedding coats as we glide along the groomed trails. Last week, we stopped for a while to watch a chipmunk on a tree. It seemed to revel in the warming sunshine and it too, noticing the different scent to the air. Spring.

The trees near the bird feeders are often now filled with flocks of finches. They sit there and chatter away. “Doesn’t that sun feel good? Shall we fly north tomorrow? I’m so glad she feeds us hulled sunflower seeds, aren’t you?”

Are they really saying all that? I don’t know, but it seems to me that their conversations must run along those lines. I know that soon I must bring the feeders in, well before the bears come out of their long hibernation.

On a snowshoe outing yesterday we saw rabbit tracks and deer tracks. The deer had come across the swamp and up into the woods behind the house. Suddenly the tracks changed dramatically from sedate, discrete hoof prints to widely spaced, deep marks, indicating that they had begun to leap through the snow, leaving long empty spaces between the tracks. I expect their white flag tails had flown up suddenly, alerting each other to danger. Had they spotted the bobcat, or had my wildly barking dogs frightened them?

The vernal ponds along both sides of the driveway are starting to melt. Down deep in the frozen mud, the frogs and salamanders are waiting to emerge and begin their mating rituals. The strengthening sun is warming down through the snow, melting the ice and unlocking the life hidden below.

The seed catalogs are all spread out on my desk, awaiting my belated, final decisions. Everything looks so good and tempting, but my garden space is limited; I must make hard decisions today and get the order out in tomorrow’s mail.

I wander to the back of the house to look out at the yard. Last fall, I stared to clear a new area and extend a stone wall around it. We talked about planting blueberries there, but there are several shrubs I’d like to buy as well. I know the birds will appreciate the blueberries as much as I will. Which of us will get the lion’s share? The partially finished wall called to me all late fall, but the frost had glued the stones to the ground so I couldn’t move them around as I wished. How soon will I be able to tackle that project? There’s no moving a wheelbarrow around in mud season!

As long as the snow holds out, I’ll snowshoe and cross-country ski. I’ll enjoy the winter for as long as possible. But I’ll also enjoy the warmer days and the strong sunlight. I’ll delight in wearing a lighter coat and thinner gloves. I’ll watch, as I go, for the first swelling of buds on trees and shrubs. I’ll note the behavior of the squirrels and birds and chipmunks. They know better than any meteorologist what’s happening and how spring is progressing.

Before long, the robin’s nest will once more be filled with chirping, gaping beaks. The nuthatches will come to the bag of dog hair I’ve hung out and pull out tufts for their nests. The frogs will fill the night air with throaty calls of love.

I’m not impatient for all that. I can wait. And I’ll enjoy the waiting and the watching for each sign of spring.

By Susan M. Poirier, Master Gardener

Actually, on any given day that's clear and not too adverse weather-wise, you can find an ideal place to take a walk. Seniors, including me, may get cabin fever during the winter months and cast about for something else to do besides card games and daytime television.

The Franklin Falls Dam is just a couple of miles from my house. So, on with the boots, coat, caps and gloves and off to the dam I go.

Here, the Army Corps of Engineers has provided the citizens of New Hampshire with an ideal multipurpose, year-round recreational facility, which draws dog-walkers, parents with small children, hikers, snowshoers, cross-county skiers, runners, mountain bikers, hunters­and in other parts of the Franklin Falls Reservoir, canoers, kayakers and fishermen.

The gate to the facility is open during most week days. As you arrive at the kiosk adjacent to the parking lot and want to know more, pick one of three brochures to peruse while you take your walk on a paved road that gently takes you to the dam.

As you stroll along, you pass a nice restroom facility on the right. Further along on the left you pass the ranger station that is staffed during the day. It houses the rangers' office and has a phone you can call on your cell phone if you have an emergency while visiting. The number is printed on all their brochures. They respond quickly and expertly when asked to do so, but otherwise remain discretely out of sight.

These rangers are an example of your tax dollars well spent. They not only keep watch on their facility, they provide educational programs to local schoolchildren and homeschoolers and host a variety of events throughout the year.

Past the ranger station, the road turns slightly left and goes down a gentle slope. Both sides of the road are lined with groves of evergreen trees planted several decades ago, which provide cooling shade in summer for folks who want to sit awhile on one of several picnic benches tucked under the trees.

For those who like to gather in groups, there is a pavilion that can be reserved for an afternoon gathering. There's also a playground for the children. I move on down the drive to a small sign that reads, "Piney Point." Just past the sign is another small parking area for those who don't have the energy to do the whole two miles of road. As I pass the parking area, an impressive vista opens.

The dam is about 200 hundred feet above the Pemigewasset River. Looking across the dam along the road that extends to the edge of the spillway on the west side, I can see the traffic along Route 3. To the left is a view of Piney Point as the birds see it. To the right is the so-called impoundment area. Unless there is a serious threat of downstream flooding, this is a prime recreational area. The Corps has built roads designed for their service vehicles that walkers can use.

The stroll along the top of the dam ends at still another parking area. A gazebo, complete with picnic table and benches, is perched on a flat expanse with a view of the river flowing from under the dam on one side and Piney Point on the other. There I have the feeling that I’m far from the cares of the world and daytime television. Only the walk back stands between me and the rest of the world, but it seems just far enough to change my feeling of being trapped by four walls and stale air.

I head to Piney Point­the trail for people who want a real hike. The trail down to the point provides the greatest challenge, dropping away from the road rather sharply through broken hardwoods and brush for a little less than a quarter of a mile.

Once at the base of the dam, I traverse to the point where the trail begins a loop through the woods on the point. It meanders along the shore of the flowing river until I reach the point and then reverses direction and proceeds along the back water section of the area.

The whole trip from the edge of the road and back is a little over a mile. (There are cutoff connectors for those who don't want to do the whole loop.) Wear your hiking boots for this trip, bring a walking stick and be prepared for a workout.

Of course, Piney Point and the dam walk are just a small part of the entire system associated with the trails, woods, and waters of Franklin Falls Reservoir. A mountain-bike trail map is available online-and of course, all the bike trails are also available to hikers. This map is just for the east side of the compound accessed by Route 127.

One of my favorite areas on the west side­quite a distance up the river, in the area between the towns of Hill and Bristol­is the Profile Falls Recreation Area, a real gem for those of us who like to fish and canoe or kayak.

You access the area off Route 3A about two miles north of Hill. Just beyond the bridge that crosses the Smith River, you make a left onto the road that leads to the parking area for the facility. I won't spoil the surprise of this little gem, beyond saying you won't be disappointed!

Editor's note: click here to learn more about Franklin Falls Dam.

By Bill Dawson, Tree Steward

Groundhog Day represents something far more significant than a rodent predicting the weather: it's the half-way point between the vernal equinox and the winter solstice. No matter what that hapless critter does-goes back in or stays out-it still means winter is half over.

Every couple of days, I snowshoe out into my yard to feed the birds. Yes, snowshoe. That’s how deep the snow has been here in northern Grafton County. The suet has disappeared quickly, and I've replenished the supplies a couple of times.

I’ve even made my own suet "pies" to help fill the birds’ need for insulating quantities of fat by mixing the suet with black sunflower seeds. One reward for putting out hulled sunflower seeds has been the appearance of a brilliant red cardinal.

After several years’ absence, the bluejays have come back to my feeders in groups of five or six. They love the cracked corn and oyster-shell grit I put out for them. I started putting out the oyster shells after I discovered that the rat-a-tat-tat I heard coming from the front of our house wasn't a woodpecker looking for insects, but a bluejay trying to find calcium in paint.

Like all female birds, the lady jays need calcium to strengthen their eggshells, and, as it turns out, calcium is an ingredient in most house paints. I also put out eggshells from hard-boiled eggs and from raw eggs, boiling the discarded shells first in hot water to make sure they won't pass along any diseases.

In my travels around the house and garden, I've noticed tracks on top of and tunnels into and beneath the snow. These tunnels into the “subnivean” (under-the-snow) zone intrigued me. The insulating snow traps heat from the earth below, so the temperature at the interface of soil and snow remains stable, hovering just around 32 degrees, no matter how cold it is above. Often I see a little head pop up from beneath, grab some seeds and vanish back under the snow.

Mice, red squirrels, weasels, voles, moles and shrews remain active in the subnivean zone. The weasel is the predator from within, living among the creatures he will prey on. Owls and hawks watch from branches above hoping to make a meal. Patterns made by the tunnels emanate on top of the snow; try looking down to see them from a window or higher ground. Predators such as coyotes, foxes, and the owls and hawks can often sense motion under the snow and make their strikes before actually seeing the animal below.

Sometimes, I even see where tiny tracks lead across the snow surface and then just stop. Evidence of an animal airlifted by an owl or hawk and quickly eaten. No trail of blood and feathers left to tell a gruesome story, just air and snow.

Another creature that benefits from the insulating qualities of snow: the Ruffed Grouse, Bonasa umbellus. Grouse often burrow into deep snow to spend the night. When fresh snowfall hides the entry hole, an unsuspecting snowshoer may get the surprise of her trip as the grouse suddenly bursts from the unmarked snow beneath her feet.

Not only mammals, but also insects and arthropods live below our line of vision under the snow. The Snow Fly, Chionea valga, and the Elongated Crab Spider, Tibellus oblongus, not only live in subnivean airspaces, but also mate and raise their young there, often providing nutrition for other creatures under the snow. Their sources for food are often the Springtails, Hypogastrura nivicola, which New Englanders refer to as snowfleas.

Harmless to humans, these tiny members of the order Collembola exist all over the world, but here in New Hampshire they remain subnivean most of the winter and come up into the daylight, scientists speculate, to mate. They usually appear on top of the snow only when the air starts to warm a bit in late February, and then resemble black pepper sprinkled over the snow.

Winter animals don't grumble about the snow and ice, they persevere or die. The myriad ways they’ve adapted to life beneath and above the snow testify to the web of life as simultaneously wonderful, awful and surreal.

Recent research in the Antarctic has revealed prolific life existing even beneath icebergs. When icebergs “calve” from glaciers, they carry with them minerals and nutrients from the soil encased within the glacier from whence it came. This enriches the waters below the ice, providing sustenance for microscopic and larger life forms, which in turn provide food for animals in a wide radius.

Some research evolving from this source of life may help solve problems caused by global warming. There are theories that the deep oceans of our polar areas may actually serve as carbon repositories.

Whether spring returns in six weeks or less, all that life below and out of our sight may prove to be more important than we realized.

By Helen Downing, Master Gardener

Sunday, January 7, 2009 at about 11:30 am, I spotted 30 to 40 turkeys crossing the field, across our back yard, on to our front yard and up the street. I got home in time to see them heading into the woods and up the hill, a swarm of curved dark shapes against the snow. A friend who lives at the top of the hill next to the oak forest watched them descend on her large crabapple tree still loaded with apples. The apples are gone now.

These aren't the first turkeys that have come to visit. Several summers ago we had what became almost a pet family of turkeys living in the neighborhood. One morning in mid-June I looked out the kitchen window and saw what looked like a flock of turtles at the base of a rock in the hedgerow. Dumbfounded, I stayed glued to the sight and watched the strange menagerie move across the field toward our garden. As they came closer, I realized I was watching nine baby turkeys under the watchful eye of the proud, stately mother.

They grew fast, feasting on field insects. Grasshoppers weren't a problem that summer. In about two months they grew to adult size, and it became hard to distinguish the mother among all the long necks poking above the field grasses. Although we'd heard turkeys can damage gardens, other than scuffing up some bare ground, we found no damage. But they did leave a wonderful collection of turkey feathers.

The turkeys gradually became braver, waddling right up to the house and circling about the lawn, feeding ravenously. One day in late summer, I watched in astonishment as they marched up from the garden across the lawn right up to our back patio, and hovered about the drive, gazing at the garage end of our two-story saltbox-style house. Then, with an awkward fluttering of huge wings, one flew to the ridgepole of the garage, landing near the weathervane.

Soon all nine were on the roof and proceeded to trot across the breezeway section of the roof, from which they then jumped to the peak of the main house. Next, I saw one on top of the chimney. We have a huge maple tree that soars above the house, and I was totally flabbergasted when one flew up to a branch in the tree. Cautiously, one after another, they all summoned up the courage to follow.

The last one was obviously not enthused about the idea, but finally made the leap from the roof ridgepole. They continued on to adjacent trees where they were surprisingly well hidden for their night-time roost. By roosting in a different location every night, turkeys hide from predators.

Checking the N.H. Fish and Game Web site, I learned that 25 turkeys were re-introduced to New Hampshire in 1975. Today, about 36,000 turkeys live here. If the flock of 30 really has only one tom, and 29 hens that each lay 10 eggs, with a conservative survival rate of five, we could have 145 more turkeys next summer plus the 30 parents. That’s 175 turkeys!

Obviously, they're thriving in our wooded suburban setting, with its combination of lawns full of insects, native shrubs full of berries, and mature oak forests producing nutrient-rich acorns. The pond where we saw them first is fed by small streams flowing off the nearby forest-covered hill. The stream flows all winter long, icing over only during the most brutal cold snaps.

I read that turkeys mate in March. Their nests are just hollows in grass on the ground. Hens lay 10 to 12 eggs; one a day for almost two weeks. The hens incubate the eggs for 28 days, but are sensitive to disturbances during this time and will readily abandon a nest. The poults are ready to leave the nest 24 hours after hatching. The poults I saw in mid-June must have been about four to six weeks old. The poults can fly when they are two or three weeks old; from then on they will roost in trees at night.

A New York Department of Environmental Conservation pamphlet, The Wild Turkey in New York, explains how turkeys survive the bitter winter weather:
During the winter, turkeys reduce their range, diminish their daily activities and often form large flocks. They frequently spend time in valley farm fields feeding on waste grain and manure spread by the farmers. Spring seeps, which are usually free of ice and snow, are also favorite feeding areas. When a severe winter storms strikes, turkeys can spend as much as a week or more on the roost, waiting the weather out. Studies have shown that healthy wild turkeys can live up to 2 weeks without food.

Incredible! As I write, my 30 turkeys, stuffed full of crabapples, must be roosting on tree branches waiting for the sun to break through tomorrow. That will be a sight to see.

By Anne Krantz, Master Gardener and Community Tree Steward

Editor's note: To help biologists gather data on the health and distribution of turkeys during the challenging winter months, the state Fish and Game Department wants to hear from you. If you see a flock of wild turkeys flock between now and the end of March, report your sighting using the electronic survey form at www.wildnh.com/turkeysurvey. Please don't report multiple sightings of the same flock.

What a wonderful way to begin a new year-three fluffy male bluebirds fluttering about outside our back picture window. If it weren’t for the glass, I could reach right out and grab them, they are so close. They flew in to our bird feeder near the window with a flock of assorted winter birds: finches, phoebes, titmice and chickadees.

I’ve seen bluebirds as late as Christmas in the past, but this is my first midwinter sighting. They are such a spectacular sight; their colors seem even more vivid against the drab trees and the bright white snow. “The blue-bird carries the sky on his back,” Thoreau wrote in his Journal of September 7, 1851.

Peterson’s Field Guide for Eastern Birds shows the northern edge of the bluebirds’ year-round range along the Connecticut and Rhode Island coasts and out to the Cape, so it isn’t as if they forgot to fly to South America. And these bluebirds looked perky and happy.

After great success last summer with a “full house”­both bluebirds and swallows successfully fledging their broods in our garden bird boxes and the wrens successful in their gourd house nearby, we added another bluebird box in the garden this fall.

Since bluebirds are insect eaters, I’m delighted to have them at work picking off the garden pests. Just days after we finally got the extra box up in November before deep frosts, five bluebirds stopped by to check out the boxes, and one actually sat on the roof of the new box. I have heard that they can be suspicious of a new box, so I was happy they’d at least perched on it. We carefully cleaned the three old boxes in the fall, removing the debris of sticks typical of house wrens and the softer nesting materials­pine needles, grasses and feathers of the bluebird. I read that it is important to clean out the boxes to remove parasites.

We learned just how important two years ago, when after brushing out the debris, my husband exclaimed, “What’s that? It just moved!” He was looking at a disgusting black blob about the size of a small bean attached to the floor of the box. Arrrgggh! We were looking at live blowfly larvae, a nasty parasite of bluebirds. Blowflies are often the reason a second bluebird brood is unsuccessful. The larvae (maggots) in the boxes crawl out at night to drink the blood of the little nestlings­the ugly side of nature!

Despite such predators, we’ve had bluebirds nesting in the garden boxes for about 20 years. They love our open field surrounded by shrubs and woods. Our gardens, with lots of fence posts, old sunflower stalks and some young Christmas trees, attract them because they can land and spot insects from these perches three or four feet from the ground. There’s lots of food for them in our garden, a good reason for not using pesticides.

They typically arrive at the bird boxes in March, when the ground is still snow-covered. But in spite of the snow, they get busy building their nests, beating out competing birds such as swallows and house wrens. This is the reason we have several boxes.

Last summer the swallows did arrive later and began swooping all about the boxes. I ran to the garden to shoo them away, but they swooped and dive-bombed me. Happily they figured out that they were to nest in the empty box and didn’t chase out the nesting bluebirds. The two species lived in peace and harmony.

Fledging is exciting to watch and I luckily caught fledging day for each of the three species. I’ve seen the bluebirds fledge before, although I wasn’t sure of the reason for all the twittering and fluttering about the box. Once they learn to fly, bluebirds leave the box and disappear into the surrounding shrubs.

I was working in the garden the day the swallows fledged, and it was truly a spectacular show. The parents chased the flock of young swallows about for what seemed to me an exhausting length of time, swooping in great arcs and circles with NO stopping. Of course I assumed that it would take several days for them to perfect their soaring techniques, and was waiting for it to happen the next day, but that was it. They were gone.

The wrens’ gourd house is attached to a tree branch so the fledging wrens flew about the tree branches making lots of noise as they perfected their flying skills. They, too, were gone in a day. So now I’m waiting for another winter bluebird sighting. One theory is that over-wintering bluebirds have the advantage of the best bluebird boxes in the spring. The first brood generally seems to be the more successful. So perhaps my bluebirds are so happy with their life here that they didn’t want to risk losing their homes by flying south for the winter. I guess they hide in the shrubs for the winter, surviving on berries and maybe frozen insects.

By Anne Krantz, Master Gardener & Community Tree Steward

The thermometer read 24, no wind whispered, and I stood on the driveway inhaling that fine autumn air. The sky, as blue as a kid’s crayon, shimmered as the sun climbed over the ridge to warm our valley. With maple leaves having already dropped, copper and gold blinded me with their fluorescence. A gorgeous autumn morning.

So quiet, so still, and then I heard it: fall. Fall, the verb.

Warmth from the sun had finally reached the treetops behind our home, melting the frost and knocking the final bits of stubbornness from the leaves. They fluttered and cascaded to the forest floor, scratching branches along the way, swooshing a bit in an unfelt air current. With no other sound to compete, they cluttered and clanked, sounding almost as metallic as they looked.

A blue jay squawked, perhaps alerting the others that summer’s camouflage would soon no longer protect them. Perhaps the jay complained about the first deep, deep frost. Perhaps it called an early morning greeting, to wake up the rest of the flock.

Nevertheless, in a week or two, the trees will be bare of this vibrant splendor and we will enter the second phase of autumn: Stick Season. Lovely for its austere elbows and knees of silver and pewter, Stick Season allows us to peer deeper into the woods, watching wildlife meander through the underbrush.

We watch as boulders appear: big, granite, glacial erratics that we haven’t seen since last winter. We welcome them back, though, obviously, they've been sitting there year-round for thousands of years. With each new layer of fall leaves slowly decomposing, the soil around them gets richer each year. Little critters burrow into that soft, matted fluff, hiding seeds and making well-insulated nests.

Perhaps the weathered boulders shift a bit, or crack apart through the freeze-and-thaw cycles during the year, but for the most part they stay put. Some of these boulders, at least the parts we can see, are much bigger than our cars. We are happy to have them remain where they are.

We admire gravity, keeping all that rock in place, and we dodge gravity as our big old oak trees release their acorns. It’s a hard-hat zone near our wood-yard. We hear those plump, nut-nuggets pummel and ricochet off the wheelbarrow, the log-pile covers, and the car if we've forgotten to move it from the ambush. Sometimes, for only for a second or two, we mistake those gray, lichen- and moss-covered boulders for visiting wildlife. Once we debated the bizarre winter arrival of a 36-inch-long rock under our bird feeder. That bobcat quickly decimated the gray squirrel population that frequents our winter-only bird feeders.

Soon, the white stuff will fall. It will cover those fallen leaves and highlight the boulders. Snow will allow us to see the animal tracks of those that live and forage in the forest behind us.

Some beech and oak leaves will cling all winter to the branches. The sun bleaches them of color and they’ll flutter in unseen breezes making a racket of white noise. Finally, they’ll either slowly tatter to pieces or drop when spring’s new buds push their stubborn selves off the branch.

The morning was really waking up now, the sun higher in that cyan sky. Suddenly I heard it dripping, then raining: Ping, ping, ping. How could that be, without a cloud in the sky?

I puzzled for only a second, then grinned and turned to our house. The sun had finally hit the metal roof. The white layer of frost had melted off the edges and dripped to the next roof. Plunk, plunk, plunk.

The frost shower only lasted a minute or two, and I thought of the fleeting moments of life that we so often miss. Find your minute of wonder. Listen to the leaves fall or the frost melt and drip. Inhale that crisp air in the morning or the sensuous deep funk of decaying leaves in the late afternoon. Embrace that tapestry of color by jumping into the leaf pile you just raked. Or crush one of those leaves in your hand and inhale its fragrance. Soon, it will be gone for another year.

By Laura Richardson, Master Gardener

The swamp is quiet now. The great nests high atop the dead trees stand empty and silent. The 18 young great blue herons and their parents have all left. Quiet reigns where once there were raucous cries.

The red-winged blackbirds and grackles have also left, as well as the tree swallows with their iridescent blue wings. The very air seems empty, bereft of their brilliant colors and acrobatic swoops. The deep-throated croaks of the bullfrogs have disappeared. Once the night was filled with their symphonic calls. I look in vain for the four young mallards that swam along so comically behind their mother. She and they have left. Where are they now? Have they joined a group on a larger body of water or have they already begun the great trek south to warmer weather?

The crickets still grind out their evening songs, but slower now, as the cooler nights lessen their enthusiasm. Sometimes a blue jay will squawk about something as it flies over, but mostly, there’s a sense of waiting, a pause in time between the noise and exuberance of summer and the slumber of winter. It’s like the time in the evening when you lie in bed, waiting for sleep, and you listen hard for sounds. Each seems magnified against the empty background.

After clear skies for much of the summer, we’ve had thick gray clouds and heavy precipitation. The rain has brought a new sound, one missing for most of the summer: water running over and through the beavers’ dam. I expect the beavers hear it too and are working to shore up their construction before the winter ice appears. I like the sound of the running water. It’s a soft sound, a background sound, a soothing cadence to the soft rustle of dried grasses.

A swamp maple is already showing off its new garment, the first of many to add a final burst of color before the bare starkness of early winter comes. Soon the sound of wind in the trees will change from a whisper of moving foliage to a rustling of desiccated brown leaves.

Up in the evergreens, the squirrels are busy and not as quiet. With self-important chirps, they dash from limb to limb, out to the very end, knocking off seeds and pine cones, then quickly scurry down the trunk to the ground to gather up all they can. Last fall they must have buried some sunflower seeds in the area behind our shed, for now tall sunflowers nod their heavy heads there like small giants asleep on their feet. How many other plants have begun life thanks to the squirrels’ need to stash food away for colder days?

Suddenly, the winterberry has erupted in brilliant red. One day the berries were a subtle green and the next, scarlet pearls shone out from the leaves. How did it happen so quickly? Nearby, the goldenrod is flaunting sunny hues to light up the shortening days, while the asters add soft shades of purple to the final hours of summer. The elderberries too, are rich in color now, the deep purple looking luscious enough to eat. A small cluster of black-capped chickadees flits from branch to branch, calling as they go, while searching the bark for insects. They let me stand close by, still and silent, and eavesdrop on their conversation.

Evening slips in earlier now. The air is different­crisper, sharper. The sun, already lower in the sky, begins to sink down behind the tall pines long before I’ve finished my twilight walks. I watch the bats dart about overhead. Flit, flit­and gone, lost against the darkening trunks. Only when they fly above the treetops can I see them silhouetted against the sky. Feast now, I tell them, winter is coming.

Everything is in abeyance, waiting, waiting. Standing here, I feel as if Mother Nature is holding her breath, stretching out the last, lingering days of summer while she gathers her energies for the great burst of autumn and its riotous exuberance of reds, oranges, and yellows. And then, at last, the deep rest and deeper quiet of winter.

By Susan M. Poirier, Master Gardener

Today I watched a turkey vulture as it dipped and turned and circled over the swamp. The day was cloudy so perhaps the thermals hadn’t built up enough to enable the big bird to soar high in the sky as it usually would. I was pleased to see it so low though; I could watch it clearly with bare eyes and didn’t need to move the binoculars around the sky, trying to keep up with it.

Watching a large bird effortlessly float through the air is nothing short of awe-inspiring. Just the slightest dip of a wing and the entire bird changes direction, zooming down towards the ground to check out a dark spot that might be a road kill; another brief movement and back up it soars.

When I first started going on bird walks with experienced birders, I was thrilled to see these black specks way up in the sky.

“What’s that bird?” I asked eagerly.

The reply was a bored, “TV.” These people had seen so many turkey vultures circling around that they weren’t really interested. Another jot was made on the list and the hunt went on for more exciting birds, like the golden-crowned kinglet calling softly from a thicket.

I remained interested, however. Imagine being able to float like that, for hours at a time, gently gliding into a dip, then out again, soaring higher, then making a quick movement and a change of direction to bring myself back over the territory from a new angle.

My interest was really sparked the day an enormous black vulture with an ugly bald head swept past me at great speed, just above eye level. I suppose it had seen or smelled something dead and tasty nearby, and I had walked nearly into its path when it came down for a closer look.

Yes, I did say “dead and tasty.” They soar over fields and forests, roads and highways, to seek that unfortunate deer killed by a motor vehicle, or using their incredible sense of smell to seek out a carcass hidden by a successful predator, or a calf that died shortly after birth.

Once they’ve found a carcass, they descend immediately and begin to feast. Bird biologists believe the turkey vulture’s bald head ensures that rotting remains won’t damage feathers where the bird can’t reach to clean them. They are neither neat nor fussy eaters. Dead amphibians, reptiles and birds are just as welcome to them as domestic and wild mammals. They’ll even eat fish.

You might wonder why you’ve never seen a turkey vulture nest high in a tree. Surely a bird this large would need a very big nest. The answer is simple: they don’t bother to make nests. They lay their one to three eggs (usually two) on the ground on rocky ledges, in large crevices, in caves, or in hollow snags (dead trees). In the Northeast, they lay their eggs in May or June, and about two and a half months later the young have fledged.

Once, it was rare to see turkey vultures circling in the sky. For much of the last hundred years, the birds kept to a range more south of us than they do now. But these large birds are now increasing their range dramatically. Is a warmer climate bringing them north? Maybe the growing deer population is encouraging these carrion-eaters to move our way. We keep building more roads, and the increased traffic probably means more road kills. Perhaps these easy meals are driving the turkey vultures’ expansion.

As I watch the bird turn effortlessly, its wing tips flared out, its light-colored head easily visible against the dark body, I’m not thinking about why it’s here. Just watching it float and dip and circle is such a treat.

I think of the nature programs I’ve seen on television, with the big vultures of Africa squabbling over a dead rhino or giraffe. The scene appears exotic and far away, but right here in our own corner of the Northeast, similar scenes are repeated every day.

Just substitute a road-killed deer for the rhino-the action is the same. Turkey vultures fill an important niche in our environment, recycling the remains of dead animals. And it’s happening right outside our doors.

By Susan M. Poirier, Master Gardener
UNH Cooperative Extension

I was quite young, perhaps 10, when I found the head.

 I had by that point seen a few gruesome horror films on the sly, but my imagination couldn’t grasp an explanation for the sight of the severed head of a goldfinch impaled on the barbed wire fence at the bottom of the field. It must have been spring; the goldfinch was in his bright courtship attire. I must have looked anxiously over my shoulder.

 A decade or so later I read about shrikes, and another decade or two passed before I saw one. This winter again I’ve heard a northern shrike singing in the field across the road. Its scientific name Lanius excubitor translates to “butcher watchman.” Carolus Linnaeus, the famed father of modern taxonomy, gave this bird its name of “watchman.”

 Linnaeus was praised for developing a logical, double-name system for describing the relationships among plants based on similarities in their reproductive structures. He was apparently more patient in observing the minutiae of flora than fauna because he concluded that the shrike was taking its sentinel stance at the tops of bushes, poles, and trees to forewarn little birds of the approach of a hawk.

 Shrikes may indeed be watching for hawks in their own self-interest, but they also have a culinary interest in the songbirds. This revelation has been utterly horrifying to some bird lovers. A close look at a shrike reveals an unusual head-size-to-body ratio and a distinct raptor hook to the bill. Sweet little birds sometimes overlook this anatomical feature. It is said that the shrike will even lurk in the underbrush beckoning curious birds with pleading murmurs.

 It was an unfamiliar voice that drew my attention to the shrike, a series of not-quite-melodic phrases that go nowhere and seem not to repeat. “If perseverance deserved success, the shrike would take high marks as a singer,” wrote Frank Chapman in the 1895 Handbook of Eastern North America. It is written that both sexes will sing and, come to think of it, I wonder why this bird would be singing at all, given that its breeding home—Alaska and central Canada—is so far north?

 This wolf in sheep’s clothing has the delicate feet of any perching bird. The element of surprise and a swift knock on the back of the head secures a meal for the shrike. The word “shrike” has the same Anglo Saxon root as “shriek,” though whether the shriek comes from the shrike, the victim, or the horrified bird-fancier is not clear.

 “One has to have something of the savage in him to enjoy thoroughly the study of the shrike,” wrote Edward Brayton Clark in 1901. “As a matter of fact, the close daily observance of the bird involves some little sacrifice for the person whose nature is tempered with mercy. The shrike is essentially cruel. It is a butcher pure and simple and a butcher that knows no merciful methods in plying its trade. More than this, the shrike is the most arrant hypocrite in the whole bird calendar. Its appearance as it sits apparently sunning itself, but in reality keeping sharp lookout for prey, is the perfect counterfeit of innocence.”

 The older nature books are full of such accusations directed at this hunter. However, the shrike gives chase solely for the purpose of culling the not-so-fleet to secure food. These writers choose to forget that a human hunter often kills for mere sport or trophy.

 It isn’t every year one can find a shrike in a New England pasture. “Like the bold Norse robber barons of old, these birds come down from their Northern wilds to prey on Southern wealth,” wrote Ora Willis Knight in 1908. Ornithologists report that it is mostly the immature shrikes with faint barring of the breast that wander south in the fall and depart in the spring. In times of cyclical rodent crash in Canada, even more birds will visit and these may travel even further south into the U.S. At this time of year, this northern shrike is sating him or herself mostly with rodents.

 In its summer breeding grounds, the shrike is also known as grasshopper hawk, cricket hawk, or mouse hawk, acknowledging the main staples of its diet. Shrikes can also take a few snakes and frogs. Like a storefront butcher, a male shrike may hang a flamboyant display of fresh kill in a thorn bush or shrub to impress a prospective mate with his powers of providence. Food may be similarly cached against lean times, and this is probably the circumstance I witnessed so many years ago.

 If you should be lucky enough to glimpse one of these gray visitors, wish him or her well on the passage north come spring. Certainly we have mice to spare here this winter.

Note: A version of this article was first published in the Bradford Bridge, a community newsletter

By Ann Eldridge, UNH Cooperative Extension Wildlife Coverts Cooperator

These are the days to drink in the precious gold of autumn. As the sun slants low in the sky, the golden hues dazzle us in their brilliance. The black-eyed Susans in the garden flaunt their yellow petals at the wind, which replies by swinging them jauntily in the sunshine. Behind them, tall golden sunflowers nod their huge heads. Each day, the centers expand outward, enveloping the yellow petals until all that’s left are the seeds.

The chipmunks race up the tall stalks to stuff their cheeks with seeds. The chickadees are there too, often hanging upside down as they peck away. A bird releases one seed from its cradle then flies away to crack it open and feast. Are they the birds that have been here all summer long? Or have our birds flown south already and these are migrants from further north, happy to have found a feast to sustain them on their long journey?

Other birds are busy gathering seeds, too. Another flash of gold announces the goldfinch, and soon a small flock of finches is busy eating seedheads around the garden. I watch one bird land on a grass blade nearby and the light stalk sways nearly to the ground. Undeterred, the bird moves along to the very end of the stalk and nibbles on the seed.

The sun dazzles today. It lights up the fading black-eyed Susans and the heavily blooming sunflower stalks, and behind them, the pale gold of clumps of Karl Foerster ornamental grasses. A light breeze is music to the grass, which seems to dance with wild joy.

The goldenrod is buzzing as the bees cover the surface of each cluster of blooms. The bees seem to know that the oncoming cold will soon take the flowers, so they hurry from blossom to blossom. The bees themselves are a golden hue, as are the pouches of pollen on their legs. From sun to flower to bee to pollen, the circle of life itself is represented in the colors of this pigment we humans value so much.

I pick up a fallen maple leaf. The outer edges are a rich, deep red which subtly melds into orange and then gold. In the low sunshine, the colors speak of many things: of spring showers and slowly lengthening days, of the warmth of summer; of cool fall evenings with bright full moons.

On one edge of the leaf, a little grey spider eyes me, then hops to another part of the leaf further away. “Where will you spend the winter?” I ask him. He doesn’t answer, so I put the leaf down where I found it and hope he will survive until spring.

By Susan M. Poirier, UNH Cooperative Extension Master Gardener

While I love gardening and swimming in the summer, watching the foliage change in the fall, and skiing and snowshoeing in the winter, there's nothing that makes me feel alive quite like the first warm days of spring. A scent calls to me, and I simply must get outside to enjoy the unique aromas of the season.

This corner of New Hampshire was buried under nearly 150 inches of snow this past winter, a record for us. Now, each day I count how many stones in the garden wall are newly visible, which trees are starting to bud out, and how much more brown earth is visible near the dirty piles of snow. Those piles are still high, but they are melting and spring is definitely here.

In one patch of earth, I notice a small flock of juncos feeding. Since they weren't here during the long winter months, I assume they've journeyed from somewhere south of us. They bustle about, finding a few stray seeds scattered by the blue jays, which roil the feeders by suddenly taking off. A robin hops along, searching for something tasty in the ground.

On my walk, I'm serenaded along the way by the red-winged blackbirds. First comes a little bell-like sound and then the wings open, flashing the distinctive red patch, and the head bends down and forward for the big "scree." Three males are dueling furiously. First one sings out and the moment he's finished, a second starts up, followed immediately by a third. Their perches are only a few feet apart. Will they really nest so closely or will one remain victorious while the others leave for new territories?

The common grackles have returned, too. Their brilliant yellow eyes stand out from their lustrous blue-black coats, shining iridescently in the sunlight. Clustering together on a tall tree, they have long and raucous discussions about what? Their recent flights north? The quality of the sunflower seeds at my feeders (duly brought in each night now that the bears are astir)? The depth of snow on the still-frozen swamp? Perhaps they, like me, are simply delighting in the warm spring air.

Nearby, great blue heron couples are choosing their nesting sites. Two of last year's nests are already taken. Refurbished a bit, they're now ready and a heron stands guard over each while the mates are off doing some fishing. Perhaps the first eggs have already been laid. A third nest is being looked over by a pair in mating plumage. They stand on the nest and peer down at it, appearing to ask: What do you think? Will this one do? I call that nest "faraway" because it's off by itself, a short distance from the remaining nests used last summer.

In another tree, two birds stand near a small pile of sticks. I watch while one flies off to a pine and pulls some foliage to spruce up their new home. When it returns, the mate calls out to him before taking the bough and carefully trying it here and then there until just the perfect spot is found. Slowly, the nest takes shape.

Although two more of last year's nests stand empty, the heron activity is far from over. A fifth pair has also chosen a new site for their nest. They've placed few shortish branches in a crotch where two limbs meet the trunk of a long-dead pine. The herons stand one above the other and peer out in different directions over the swamp. I love their looks: plumage flying off the back of the heads, bold orange bills contrasting with the blue-gray feathers.

Nearby I spot yet another pair. They stand side by side in a tree to the south of the others, looking off over the swamp. Last year's five mating couples produced fourteen young; I can hardly wait to see how many six pairs will produce this season.

Meanwhile, one small area of the swamp has freed itself of ice and snow. The opening starts at the beavers' spillway and runs out for perhaps 20 feet. I scan it for ducks, but see none. I know some have returned to the larger lakes and ponds in the surrounding areas. Perhaps soon the swamp will have enough open water to tempt a mallard pair or a beautiful hooded merganser and his mate to fly in for a rest. Or maybe a wood duck couple will discover the nesting box high in the tree on the west side of the swamp.

It's spring. They'll be here soon.

By Susan M. Poirier, Master Gardener

UNH Cooperative Extension

What a remarkable world we inhabit: remarkable in that Gil and I often “remark” about some interesting event, critter, or transition in the world around us. Yet, however much we consider ourselves simply as passive observers, we still participate.

Like at the blue jay’s wake. 

My husband Gil and I live in the woods next to the White Mountain National Forest. Our home has windows. Birds crash into their own reflections there, some defending their territory, some thinking the reflected branches are yet more forest, some in what appears to be a hormone-induced tizzy during mating season. Windows kill some birds. Some survive.

We see ghostly smudges and bits of feathers on our windows, and watch as dazed birds regain their composure, shake themselves, and return to the forest. Last year we had a most incredible full-body imprint of a blue jay on a window. It looked like the Shroud of Turin. We think we would recognize that individual jay today, its image was so remarkable. 

The National Audubon’s Web site says: “Recent evidence shows that collisions with glass may be a major source of avian mortality that's widely overlooked. Experts believe that about 100 million birds die each year in collisions with buildings and skyscrapers in the U.S. and Canada alone.” Wow! More reason for awe and action.

At dusk a blue jay flew into a window on the north side of our home. It laid in the snow, stiff little legs in the air, a look of disbelief in its open eyes. Gil picked it up to toss into the woods, where it would complete the cycle of birth to decomposition. We looked at the beautiful, now-silent, formerly bullying bird, its regal pointy head, its deep blue feathers still lustrous. We pursed our lips in a moment of guilt and recognition.

Then Gil tossed the dead jay into a brushy area with glacial boulders, moss, and discarded Christmas trees. The bird landed awkwardly. We shrugged, assuming some critter would appear in the night and grab it for a quick protein blast.

The following mid-morning, a raucous ruckus stopped us in our tracks, the sound exponentially louder than the normal alarm signaling a predatory bird in the neighborhood or the announcement of refilled birdfeeders. We peered into the trees.

A blue jay sat on each tree and branch within a thirty-foot radius of the dead jay, all screaming at that stiff, still angle of blue that held their attention.

Each live bird faced the dead bird. More flew in to join the commotion. The feeders sat empty. No other birds chirped or sang or cried, as if to reserve this sacred moment for the blue jays. They blamed and shouted and pleaded. They cawed and keened and criticized.

From branches only a few feet from the ground, forty, fifty, sixty feet up, all faced their dead compatriot. Some flew in closer to the deceased, tilting their heads as if to confirm death; others remained high above, calling to yet more jays from further distances, shouting the news.

It all lasted about three minutes. It seemed much longer. We stood, frozen, awestruck. We think forty or fifty blue jays attended the wake. When it ended, it ended abruptly. The forest went silent. Eerie.

One by one, the jays flew off. Then a chickadee chirped, a finch flitted to a feeder, and the forest regained normalcy. The dead blue jay has since been overlooked, forgotten, ignored, left to decompose with brittle blue spruce carcasses, quietly back into the earth.

Gil thinks the jays were confused and were either encouraging the dead bird to get up or running impact trajectories about how the bird had bounced that far from the window.

I think they knew the bird was dead. I can’t help but anthropomorphize. I think that community of jays gathered for a mourning ritual and cawed a eulogy.

Gil and I eavesdropped through the keening and cawing at the blue-jay’s wake, despite our guilt, despite knowing our home’s windows had killed a territorial and assertive blue jay, and numerous uneulogized chickadees, titmice, and finches. We even ate the grouse that broke its neck last winter.

This weekend we installed window coverings to reduce heat loss from our home. The Audubon Society recommends shades with a white backing like ours to decrease the reflectivity of windows and minimize  crashing incidents like the one that killed the jay. Our shades look good, save energy, cover the smudged windows, and—we  hope—will improve the longevity of our avian neighbors.

I say, if we are here to live, really live, we need to do all we can to minimize our impact on neighboring communities of other species. We need to acknowledge and respect our surroundings, with wonder and joy, some guilt, but mostly with awe.

By Laura Richardson, UNH Cooperative Extension Master Gardener

I found it! For years, I've been searching every woodpecker hole in every dead or live tree I could reach. All the books say that many birds use woodpecker holes for nesting sites, but I'd never found a nest in a hole.

I've seen many nests built in crotches of trees, including one I noticed only because a brilliant male scarlet tanager flew right in front of me and up into the nest to feed his young. I've seen nests in bird houses I've put out and robins' nests on the jut-out of the dining-room bay window under the shelter of the porch roof.

The phoebes also like the tops of our outside spotlights and frequently nest there. Once I found the nest of a northern Baltimore oriole out in the middle of the swamp. But a nest in a tree hollow carved out by woodpeckers? No, never. Until yesterday.

We've had wonderful snow for snowshoeing and cross-country skiing this winter, but the surplus of white stuff has meant hours of clearing. By the time I've shoveled the paths to the woodpile and bird feeders, cleared the decks and porch, created paths for my little dogs, pulled snow off the porch roof, I'm too tired to get out there and enjoy the snow.

Yesterday, however, I stole some time. I'd donned snowshoes to get behind the woodpile to clear it off from the back. While working, I noticed that the snow had covered the top of the fence in one area, so when I finished, I headed out into the woods. They were so lovely still, peaceful, the snow clinging to many branches. I could walk everywhere since the fallen trees, small boulders, stone walls, and low shrubs were covered in snow.

I followed a path made by a deer, trekking over to a large, dead tree to check it out. This tree must have been a monster in life. It had at least four trunks, one which showed signs of someone attempting to cut it with a saw 10 feet above the ground. One of the trunks lay buried under the snow. The bark was gone, and I could see many tunnels made by grubs and holes made by woodpeckers. I searched carefully, but no sign of a nest.

Out onto the swamp I went. On my last visit, I'd noticed an odd hole, with dirty footprints all around it but none leading to or away from it. Some creature must have come up from under the snow, looked around, and headed back inside. After the most recent 10-inch snowfall, however, there was only a small opening under a dead tree to see.

Up above, the five heron nests, piled high with snow. stood out starkly from their tree supports. I hope that somewhere down south the heron pairs and their 14 young are feeding well and enjoying the warmth and sunshine. Next month, the first arrivals should be here, scouting out the territory and choosing the best nest site. I'm glad these nests are all still intact. A few additional branches to refurbish, and they'll be all set for a new crop of squabbling youngsters.

A hairy woodpecker flew nearby and began working on a tree. Bits of bark and wood flew out and fell onto the snow below. The dead evergreens seemed almost alive again with green moss hanging from each branch. I love to look at the dead trunks. Stripped now of bark, they reveal the twists and turns each tree made as it reached for the sun, shifted slightly to one side to grow around another, repaired the damage from a broken limb. One tree in particular was covered with knobs formed when the tree grew out over a stub. Little insect holes filled the trunk as well as one or two larger ones made by the birds.

I moved to a new area and noticed a broad snag about eight feet tall. The lower portion was nearly hollow and above, at eye level, was a large hole clearly bored by a woodpecker. I peeked inside and there it was,a beautiful bird's nest.

Snow had filled the nest's cavity so I carefully removed it to see the construction of the nest itself. Dried mud and grasses formed a perfect circle. The inside was as smooth as a carefully sanded, turned wooden bowl. The nest was large, at least as large as the ones the robins build above our window. The birds had carefully selected an opening which faced east, avoiding both the heat of the summer sun and the winds of the north and west. Perfect.

I noted the location of that tree. In the spring and summer, I won't be able to see the opening from the shore, but I'll be able to watch for adult birds flying in and out of the nest. I'm curious to know what species built the nest. Now that I've found it, I'm going to enjoy it.

By Susan M. Poirier, Master Gardener, UNH Cooperative Extension

It was a perfect winter day. On the horizon, the clear blue sky was bordered by a narrow ruffle of puffy clouds. Eight inches of powdery snow covered the ground. The temperature was cool, but the warming sun pulled me outside. I dressed quickly, eager for whatever I might find in the fresh, crisp air.

I trudged out past the bird feeders and along the path which runs between the stone walls of the vegetable and daylily gardens, down the hill, and through the gate in the fence. I was headed, as always, for the swamp to see what I might find on this beautiful day. As I walked along the fence, I saw that I’d had company sometime before this morning’s light snowfall. There along the outside of the fence were the tracks of a bobcat. The new snow had partially filled them in, but the size and spacing convinced me that the big cat had been prowling along our fence once again. Whether it comes in the fine weather or not I don’t know. I suppose it might walk all around the swamp to get to this fence. I’ve no real way of knowing, but every winter, once the snow has fallen, I know by its tracks that it’s come across the ice to patrol here once again.

I followed the tracks down the hill and into the swamp, but a step or two quickly convinced me that the ice just wasn’t ready yet for my weight. As my eyes followed the cat’s tracks across the ice, I wished I’d thought to bring along the camera. The beavers’ lodge was so lovely with its cloak of snow. The orange-topped surveyor’s stake, which the beavers had appropriated to add to their home, was covered now with white and looked from here like just another branch.

I walked further along the swamp’s edge, and I suddenly startled a dozen doves. Off they flew with a call of alarm so unlike their normal mourning coo. Their explosion from the tree where they’d been resting masked a tap-tap-tapping sound which I’d not noticed before. Once the birds were gone, I followed the sound with my eyes until I found a hairy woodpecker on a tall, narrow tree.  

The woodpecker’s beautiful black and white coloration, as well as its large size, is always a marvel to me. This one, a female, lacked her mate’s brilliant red patch on the back of the head. Still, the wide white streak down the center of her back was perfectly balanced by the white and black stripes of her wings. Down the trunk she came, probing, listening, tapping here and there. After she worked her way down about five feet, she returned to her starting point and moved a few inches over to repeat the track. Down and up, tail pressed tightly against the smooth bark, head cocked to one side and then another before the strong bill drilled in to test the wood for succulent insects.

Where does she hide when the temperatures drop down into the low digits? I presume she has a favorite hole somewhere to snuggle down in. Today, in the brilliant sunshine making its way through the leafless trees, she stands out with clarity and beauty.

A few moments later, something startled the doves from their new resting place, and once more they burst forth with their danger call. A chickadee nearby picked up the alarm and warned others of my presence. “Chick–a-dee-dee-dee.” I read recently what scientists have learned: the number of “dees” a bird calls indicates the type of danger.

“Hey,” I called softly to it. “Don’t you recognize me? I’m the one who fills the feeder with sunflower hearts!”

I love the chickadees. Not only are they such lovely small beings, but they are the politest of birds at the feeders, taking only one seed before flying away to consume it. This one left me after a moment or two and headed back to the feeder for another morsel.

With a sigh, I realized that I had to follow suit. Reluctantly I left the world of beauty, of nature, of outside and returned to the house. “I’ll be back,” I promised both myself and the woods. I know I will. I’ll be beckoned again, and I’ll answer.

 By: Susan M. Poirier, Master Gardener

Resolved to avoid the usual holiday stress, I arose one morning recently and planned my day around wrapping Christmas presents. I decided to get out and fill the bird feeders first. Recent snow had coated the ground with almost a foot of light powder and the chickadees were getting impatient. A bucket of black oil sunflower seeds, a few ears of Indian corn saved from this year’s harvest, and I was ready to roll.

As I was filling the feeders hanging on an old lilac bush, the chickadees arrived above me and scolded hungrily. Plodding through the snow, I crossed the yard to a wooden feeder mounted on an old pine stump. This feeder has a roof and is a favorite of blue jays and squirrels, both red and gray. The stump is on uneven ground, so I need to stretch and balance precariously to reach the feeder and pour in seeds and cobs of dried corn.

A slight sound above my head made me look up; an owl flew slowly and silently from a branch just overhead to a tree not too far away. With my eyes locked on the owl, I finished refilling the bird feeder.

The owl continued to perch and watch me as I backed away silently, wondering how much time it would take to run in the house and get the binoculars before it flew away. When I returned, the owl had flown back to its original branch, assured that it was now safe to begin its vigil anew.

I had noticed that in flight it appeared to be a light, creamy beige with touches of a golden brown. In addition, streaks of brown ran vertically down its lighter chest, and under its beak, a band of checkered brown and cream feathers formed a thick ruff about the neck.

Perched with its back to me, its large dark eyes peered first to its left and then its right, head turning to look in my direction, which gave the illusion of a full, 180 degree revolution. For the next three and one half hours, it remained on its watch; apparently, a bird feeder can feed more than the seed eaters on my list.

Suddenly, the owl’s tail lifted and its wings opened; it dove below the feeder and slipped gracefully into the space created between a log and the several inches of new snow. For a few seconds, the owl disappeared, only to reappear suddenly as it emerged from the trough. It sat a few minutes in the snow with a mouse like tail hanging from its beak. Lunch soon over, it flew back to its perch.

What a photo op! Would this owl with its presidential like stature stay long enough to pose? I made another mad scramble to retrieve my camera, and, sure enough, the stately bird posed as patiently as a New Hampshire presidential primary candidate, turning its head first left, then right, then swiveling to look directly behind itself.

I don’t know when the owl left, but it couldn’t have been long before dark because both my husband and I continued to check every chance we had, and it was there until the light faded.

Needless to say, I didn’t get much gift wrapping done. At some point during the afternoon, I checked my bird book and discovered that this was a Barred Owl, the one who calls, “Who cooks for you? Who cooks for you all?”

Checking the reports of recent New Hampshire bird sightings at Virtual Birder (www.virtualbirder.com/bmail/nhbirds/latest.html), I discovered that Barred Owls are more plentiful in New Hampshire this winter than in years past and learned this may be due to a crash in the red backed vole population in Canada, which forced the owls to move south for food. Barred Owls typically hunt at night, but under stress, hungry owls will hunt during the day.

Knowing that hunger may have driven this bird to my backyard adds a bittersweet tinge to my owl sighting. Hopefully, the owl will survive the winter here by finding all the voles that plague my garden.

If I stop and think back on this day, my neglected to do list didn’t get any shorter, but my list of memorable moments did get longer.

By Helen Downing, Community Tree Steward

A pair of white ducks appeared in our neighborhood pond in August. Each time we drove by, we saw them reveling in their element, bottoms up, foraging for food or just swimming around unimpeded in the pond.

It was obvious these weren’t wild ducks, accustomed to the seasonal comings and goings of nature’s cycles. They were domestic ducks, unable to fly or to defend themselves from predators. Still, they survived happily in the pond in late summer.

As fall approached, several of the neighbors joined us in concern for their fate. My grandsons, with their mother, brought food and the ducks welcomed them and even seemed to anticipate the children’s visits complete with handouts. These ducks were used to human beings. No doubt they had been adorable, fluffy ducklings at Easter time. But by the end of summer, the charming babies had grown to full grown ducks, perhaps a bit aggressive and needing accommodations that some suburban family couldn’t provide. Were they then abandoned to fend for themselves, without thought for their ultimate fate? Did parents persuade their children, and perhaps themselves, that the ducks would live happily ever after in our neighborhood pond?

September passed, and then as October moved on, the neighborhood became increasingly concerned. The ducks themselves grew more dependent on the children’s provisions. We all knew if we did nothing these two couldn’t survive once the pond froze over. They would become dinner for someone, if not for Mr. Fox, then for the coyotes or a fisher.

So, one day the children and their mother arrived at our barn with the ducks in the back of the Subaru. The female had been easily captured, but the drake was skittish. The timely arrival of a neighbor saved the day and the pair came to their adopted home in a pen by the barn.

We wondered how they would get on with our ancient Chinese geese noisy creatures but otherwise harmless. A single Indian runner drake shares their pen. (His mate succumbed to a weasel last winter I found her headless carcass in the pen one snowy morning.) What would they think of these new arrivals?

As it turned out, the ducks were welcomed and moved in without incident. They may have missed the freedom of the pond, but they were glad to have food and shelter as winter approached and the cold intensified. Each morning I broke the ice in their water pans, and all drank gratefully.

No sooner had the days begun noticeably to lengthen, in late February or early March, than a white egg appeared in the shelter. Every day, through the spring and early summer, Mrs. Duck produced a single egg. We used them in various ways they are rich and tasty. We saved a half dozen for the nearby Montessori pre school that likes to hatch some chicks or ducks each spring in their incubator. Some of these orphans come back to our farm, either to lay eggs or to find their way to the freezer in the fall.

Sure enough, after 28 days of incubation, the duck eggs hatched, producing four fluffy ducklings. School was over, so home they came to our “nursery.” When they outgrew the small nursery pen, we introduced them to the ducks and geese at the barn. Mrs. Goose decided on motherhood so enthusiastically that she crushed one of them. Another succumbed to her over protective instincts; she was too big and her size overwhelmed them. The others were returned to a safer pen, and after a few weeks we tried again to integrate the little flock of water fowl. This time the Indian Runner drake proved such an ardent lover that the poor ducklings were tattered and thoroughly intimidated by his attentions. So they are back in a safe haven for now, and we shall have roast duck in the fall.

Such a responsibility we assume for our fellow creatures even if we will eventually eat them! And the parent ducks, rescued from the pond, will survive another winter to produce eggs. The children at the Montessori school can again experience the miracle of tiny ducklings emerging from their shells. We’ll make egg salad of the rest.

By Carolyn Baldwin, Community Tree Steward

The sharp, raspy call introduced a certain harshness into the otherwise peaceful solitude of an early November afternoon. I had been enjoying the stillness as I sat on my patio, neatly tucked into the space where the floor of the sun porch met the rear wall of my Cape Cod-style home.

The call came again…chick-a-dee-dee-dee-dee. I directed my eyes to the arbor on my left and looked up into the yellowing leaves clinging to the hardy-kiwi vine. There on the vine, perched in a defiant stance better suited for a larger, more intimidating bird, the black-capped chickadee once more sounded the call, which seemed directed solely toward me and which seemed to be chastising me for having failed to perform some duty.

Just behind the chickadee hung the brown, metal bird feeder. “It’s empty,” I thought. “I put out the last load of black-oil sunflower seed before the end of March.” Could this bird be one of those who spent a good part of the past winter feeding here? If so, he (or she) must remember and realize that I am the person responsible for filling it.”

I scanned the area for other chickadees, thinking perhaps that this one was calling to family members, rather than actually trying to influence me. But he was alone and none of his species, or any other species, responded to the call.

“Very curious,” I thought. “I’ll have to remember to pick up some more seed.”

Days went by. I completed several shopping trips without remembering to pick up food for my avian neighbors. But the chickadee, being considerably younger and hungrier than I, persisted.

A week later, we replayed the scene on the patio. I sat and he complained. Of course, I assumed it was the same individual bird, though it could have been another. To me, chickadees look and sound alike, and their quickness and smallness make it difficult to spot any unique characteristics. However, the message was clear: if I didn’t refill the feeder soon, there would be consequences.

In all seriousness, I didn’t fear the wrath of a lone chickadee. It was more compassion than fear that motivated me to respond to the threat. Besides, the black-capped chickadee is such a loveable creature. Most New Englanders admire these creatures for their daring, precision and crowd-pleasing antics.

Necessity found me at the store the next day, and the bird-badgering had occurred recently enough to joggle a few brain cells into recalling the need for sunflower seeds. I managed to get the 25-lb sack into the car and back to the house where the empty bird feeder hung. The seed, being bulky and not immediately necessary, sat on the passenger-side of the front seat for a couple more days. Then, once again I was reminded by the tiny-but-vocal bird, with a black patch appearing like a perfectly-aligned toupee, that it was time to act.

It was dusk before I found it convenient to fill the feeder. The following afternoon, I glanced out the window in the kitchen and noticed a significant amount of avian activity at the feeder. The chickadees would flit in, grab a seed and retreat to the kiwi vine. The finches tended to secure the perch and remain on the feeder, selecting seed, until forced off by more aggressive individuals.

I wondered how the word spread so quickly that there was now food at the site. Who discovered it, and how was the discovery communicated to the others?

Later, I assumed my customary post near the feeder on my patio chair to catch the fleeting warmth of late afternoon sun. I’d put on thick socks under my open-toed sandals to protect against the cool cement surface of the patio slab. I crossed my legs with the right ankle resting on my left knee, admired what remained of the autumn foliage, and contemplated the stack of cordwood in the yard.

My reverie was disturbed suddenly by a flutter of tiny wings as a lone chickadee dropped from my roof and flew directly toward me. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched him approach and land directly on the tip of my large toe. He perched there for several seconds, seemingly aware that I was alive and not a mere statue.

At first, I felt pleased to share this moment with such a loveable creature, sure that he was honoring me for having supplied the life-sustaining seed. Then suddenly, it became clear to me that my status as master over the lowly chickadee was being called into question.

Could that look in his steely, dark eye convey more than simple appreciation for my kindness? Perhaps the chickadee meant to deliver a warning that future neglect might result in punishment—a sharp peck on my toe, for instance.

This episode will give me something to ponder as I dutifully fill the feeder during the frigid winter days ahead.

Robert Powell Hughes, UNH Cooperative Extension Community Marine Docent

For Christmas my grandsons (with some help from their Dad) made me a bird feeder. The design is simple: an open frame about a foot square with a screen on the bottom, suspended from the four corners by cords that attach to a loop about two feet above the frame.
           
We hung the feeder on a small branch of a young beech tree, high enough so we could just reach to fill it, high enough (we hoped) to be out of reach of the deer, and far enough from the trunk to discourage the cat from exploiting the situation. The south-facing windows both upstairs and down provide a front row seat for observers. We poured a couple of quarts of sunflower seeds onto the screen and awaited the verdict of the intended beneficiaries.

In no time a flock of finches arrived. They mobbed the feeder, and those who couldn’t get the first bite waited impatiently, an unruly crowd pushing and shoving, a flying dance among the branches. The tree, in midwinter, sprouted feathered leaves, flying off all at once for no apparent reason, only as far as the adjacent maple. Soon they were back, twittering and competing for a place at the banquet.

Chickadees and tufted titmice hang around, taking a turn when the finches depart for a spell. Occasionally a nuthatch visits, although he seems to prefer the fancier and less crowded feeder outside the kitchen window.
           
Watching the finches is endlessly fascinating. On my window is a small feeder, only large enough for two or at most three birds at a time. Sometimes one will decide he is king of the castle and aggressively defend his throne, even sacrificing opportunities to feed as he fends off interlopers. But eventually he also flies off, and another, and yet another take his place. The little feeder requires frequent replenishment.
           
Winter is a special time on our hill. When the leaves drop in October, the view changes markedly. Sunrise, masked in summer by the foliage, can be dramatic, and it comes late enough that 7:00 a.m. risers like me can enjoy it. The distant hills and small lakes become visible. The lakes, blue before they freeze over, later appear as white, open spaces.

We who love winter are thought a bit odd by those who complain endlessly of the cold, snow and ice. But the changing seasons are a source of constant wonder. No other season offers anything that compares with the brightness of a moonlit night on fresh snow. Shadows of the bare trees create a chiaroscuro on the open field. The structure of the landscape is visible from the road—stone walls, icy streams, boulders. The fields of 19th century farmers reveal themselves, although most are overgrown now, often with mature trees.
           
A true sign of spring, in mid-February, is activity in the sugar bush. A warm sunny day brings the sap up in the maple trees, and sugar makers get ready for the year’s first harvest. Deer trails course through the forest, reminding us of the constant life that inhabits what may seem a dead landscape.
           
The goldfinches, mobbing my feeders, begin to discard their drab winter plumage for their yellow garments, in preparation for spring rituals. The chickadee whistles his spring song, sometimes even on a warm day in January. The piliated woodpecker loudly declares his territory with a persistent drumbeat and occasional screech. Neighbors report flocks of robins, and even a bluebird is heard by the beginning of March.
           
Last year’s cold, snowy March brought January (and the mobs of finches) back in earnest. But it brought the sun, brighter and warmer, shining through the south facing windows, giving the furnace and wood stove a rest four several hours during the day.

I know the snow will melt, the skis will return to the basement, and the streams will awaken, roaring through the sugar bush. Making an expedition to check the sap lines becomes an adventure with a sometimes soggy interlude.

Spring birds will return in earnest, and the finches will find food in the forest, while newcomers, the red-breasted grosbeak and the oriole, will honor my offerings, joining the ever-present chickadees and nuthatches and the charming tufted-titmouse.

By Carolyn Baldwin, UNH Cooperative Extension Wildlife Coverts Cooperator

For more information call the UNH Cooperative Extension's Family, Home & Garden Center's Info-line (toll free) at 1-877-398-4769 or send us an email. Volunteers are available to answer your questions Monday through Friday 9:00am to 2:00 p.m.

Date

A pair of white ducks appeared in our neighborhood pond in August. Each time we drove by, we saw them reveling in their element, bottoms up foraging for food or just swimming around unimpeded in the pond.

It was obvious that these were not wild ducks, accustomed to the seasonal comings and goings of nature’s cycles. They were domestic ducks, unable to fly or to defend themselves from predators. Still, they survived happily in the pond in late summer.

As fall approached, several of the neighbors joined us in concern for their fate. My grandsons, with their mother, brought food and the ducks welcomed them and even seemed to anticipate the children’s visits complete with handouts. These ducks were used to human beings. No doubt they had been adorable, fluffy ducklings at Easter time. But by the end of summer, the charming babies had grown to full-grown ducks, perhaps a bit aggressive, and needing accommodations that some suburban family could not provide. Were they then abandoned to fend for themselves, without thought for their ultimate fate? Did parents persuade their children, and perhaps themselves, that the ducks would live happily ever after in our neighborhood pond?

September passed, and then as October moved on, the neighborhood became increasingly concerned. The ducks themselves grew more dependent on the children’s provisions. We all knew that if we did nothing these two could not survive once the pond froze over. They would become dinner for someone, if not for Mr. Fox, then for the coyotes or a fisher.

So, one day the children and their mother arrived at our barn with the ducks in the back of the Subaru. The female had been easily captured, but the drake was skittish. The timely arrival of a neighbor saved the day and the pair came to their adopted home in a pen by the barn.

We wondered how they would get on with our ancient Chinese geese—noisy creatures but otherwise harmless. A single Indian-runner drake shares their pen. (His mate succumbed to a weasel last winter—I found her headless carcass in the pen one snowy morning.) What would they think of these new arrivals?

As it turned out, the ducks were welcomed and moved in without incident. They may have missed the freedom of the pond, but they were glad to have food and shelter as winter approached and the cold intensified. Each morning I broke the ice in their water pans, and all drank gratefully.

No sooner had the days begun noticeably to lengthen, in late February or early March, than a white egg appeared in the shelter. Every day, through the spring and early summer, Mrs. Duck produced a single egg. We used them in various ways—they are rich and tasty. We saved a half dozen for the nearby Montessori pre-school that likes to hatch some chicks or ducks each spring in their incubator. Some of these orphans come back to our farm, either to lay eggs or to find their way to the freezer in the fall.

Sure enough, after 28 days of incubation, the duck eggs hatched, producing four fluffy ducklings. School was over, so home they came to our “nursery”. When they outgrew the small nursery pen, we introduced them to the ducks and geese at the barn. Mrs. Goose decided on motherhood, so enthusiastically that she crushed one of them. Another succumbed to her over-protective instincts—she was too big and her size overwhelmed them. The others were returned to a safer pen, and after a few weeks we tried again to integrate the little flock of water fowl. This time the Indian Runner drake proved such an ardent lover that the poor ducklings were tattered and thoroughly intimidated by his attentions. So they are back in a safe haven for now, and we shall have roast duck in the fall.

Such a responsibility we assume for our fellow creatures—even if we will eventually eat them! And the parent ducks, rescued from the pond, will survive another winter to produce eggs. The children at the Montessori school can again experience the miracle of tiny ducklings emerging from their shells. We’ll make egg salad of the rest.

By Carolyn Baldwin, UNH Cooperative Extension Community Tree Steward

I put a woodpecker to bed every summer evening at Big Dan Hole Pond. As the daylight begins to fade and the pond quiets to mirror the lavender sky overhead, I can hear the “Pick! Pick!” of the hairy woodpecker as she wends her way through the trees along the shoreline to find her nighttime sleeping cavity.

She usually appears from the east, probing loose pieces of bark for insects on the birches, maples, oaks and beeches that grow within the nearest twenty feet of the shoreline. As she hitches from one tree to the next she gets closer to the gnarled, partially hollow core of a beech tree that stands about fifteen feet away from the shoreline and within view of my cabin.

The hollow beech is riddled with holes and pockmarks and has long since lost its top. Although it looks as if it’s about to fall over, a curious push from me one afternoon proved its worthiness to stand up to a few more winters. When I knock on it, I can hear the hollow ringing inside, slightly muffled by whatever contents wild creatures have stashed inside its cavities. It possesses about ten or eleven holes, most of them on the eastern and southeastern side of the twenty-foot high ghost of a beech tree.

Visitors have often asked me, “Going to clean up that mess?” as they nod to the old beech. “Nope,” I reply. “That’s where woodpeckers make their homes.” Sometimes people look at me strangely, but most often they ask more about the woodpeckers and where they live.

Most people understand that woodpeckers raise their young in tree cavities, but few understand that woodpeckers live in trees all year round and depend on us to keep their homes from destruction. The lakeside along my property on Dan Hole Pond is festooned with naturally made woodpecker houses, and the undeveloped shoreline provides habitat for bullfrogs, duck families and snakes, as well as for woodpeckers.

And woodpeckers recycle their homes. What starts out as a flicker cavity, for example, may be taken over another year by a pair of noisy Great Crested Flycatchers, magnificent yellow and green birds who raise their young to the sound of their policeman’s-whistle call and adorn the insides of their tree holes with snake skins.

Other large woodpeckers, such as the Pileated, will use a tree cavity for a few years, and if it is nearby a large standing pool of water like a stream or pond, it will be taken over by a wood duck to incubate its young. Once hatched, the ducklings make the long drop to the water and safety on board their mother .

Small rotting birch stubs will be excavated by downy woodpeckers and chickadees for raising their young. On winter nights whole family groups of chickadees will crowd down inside a cavity to sleep warmly inside. Once the rising sun hits the tree and warms it, the inhabitants will emerge, sleepy and dopey, to begin their daily rounds for a breakfast of insects.

Downy Woodpeckers don’t normally roost communally like chickadees. But one frosty winter morning I heard the muffled calls of Downy Woodpeckers and watched in fascination as three Downies sleepily emerged one by one from a birch cavity into the sub-zero dawn

I like watching this female hairy woodpecker go to bed at night. As she lands on the beech, she circles a few times, all the while exclaiming, “Pick! Pick!” And then nearly quicker than the eye can see, she will disappear into the tree cavity. Muffled “Picks!” follow for a minute or two, and then all is quiet. The woodpecker sleeps safely for another night.

By Cynthia A. Melendy, UNH Cooperative Extension Lakes Lay Monitor

A sunny morning after the recent ice storm when the thermometer hovered around zero and I couldn’t get out for my morning run, I contented myself with enjoying the ice-palace scenery out the window. Happily, some birds had survived the freezing rain, ice and the zero nighttime temperature, and swooped to the feeder that hangs just a foot from the back window. Perky little chickadees and tufted titmice braved the bitter cold, with no obvious signs of hypothermia.

I stayed inside because I learned the hard way that breathing in such cold air leads to a sore throat. But here were these miraculous little creatures fluttering about normally, using up tons of energy both to stay warm and to fly. Just imagine the wind chill of flight!

Obviously, they needed more food for energy after the bitter night and headed for the feeder as soon as the sun was out. The fluffy, puffy titmice flew about in a normal way, while the chickadees hid under shrubs and darted up to the feeder for a quick mouthful and then scooted back under the bushes. Both birds stood on the frozen feeder to retrieve the seeds. Their thin little legs and feet looked and functioned normally—no signs of frostbite on their toes. Their beaks worked okay, too—no frostbite there, either.

I learned a lot about birds’ winter survival strategies from the book Winter World: The Ingenuity of Animal Survival,by Bernd Heinrich. Heinrich explains that birds, especially chickadees, maintain a very high daytime body temperature of up to 108 degrees F. Talk about warm-blooded! They need an enormous amount of food to sustain their high energy output and their high body heat. They must eat all day to store enough fat (up to 10 percent of their body weight) to get them through the cold winter nights.

Chickadees’ downy feathers thicken up in the fall. When fluffed up in the bitter cold, their feathers add an inch of insulation around the tiny little bodies that weigh but 10-12 grams. At night they ball up, tucking their heads under their wings. Also, they lower their body temperature to about 85 degrees F. to conserve energy, and sleep inside cavities, maybe snuggled up with other birds.

Other unique adaptations enable winter birds to survive sudden cold snaps. Their circulatory systems pump the warmest blood to their feet to keep them from freezing. To do this, their tiny little hearts can beat up to 600 beats a minute (who counted?) Also, they shiver to maintain their body temperature, although the trembling is hidden by their feathers. This is a way of converting muscle energy into heat, and how they warm up in the morning.
 
Cold rain is their worst enemy. Wet feathers lose their insulating value. To waterproof themselves, chickadees use their beaks to squeeze oil from glands on their backs, with which they coat the protective back and wing feathers that they then spread over their bodies like an umbrella.

But most incredibly, chickadees hoard food in the fall. In fact, a region of their brains gets bigger in the fall to increase their memories, so they aren’t wasting energy looking for lost stashes of food. Now there’s a survival trick we’d all like to borrow!

When out enjoying the bracing winter sunshine, whether skiing on mountain tops, or snowshoeing in the woods, we hardly give these common little birds a second glance, but they are truly wondrous creatures. Say “Hello” to the next one you see and spend a minute watching its busy survival behaviors.

By Anne Krantz, Community Tree Steward & Master Gardener                                             

 2/15/07

In late May, I glanced out my dining room window and noticed a pair of geese snuggled in the grass in my front lawn. The grass was tall due to the spring rains that didn’t stop long enough for me to mow. The geese found it perfect for a relaxing afternoon. They looked peaceful sitting there close together, enjoying the break in the rain.

In the nine years I’ve lived here, this was the first time I’ve had geese on my property. The large wetland in back of my house is home to a blended family of three adult geese and more than a dozen goslings, but the pair in my yard wasn’t part of that family.

A day or two later, I was sitting on my couch reading. Something caught my eye outside, so I glanced up and was startled to see a goose head peering into my living room. Then a second head appeared! These birds are large! I’d heard that geese will chase and attack people, so I found it a bit unsettling to see two of them peering into my house.

The geese made my front yard their home for two-and-a-half weeks. I never saw or heard them arrive. One moment the yard was empty and the next, the pair of geese would be there, walking, pecking at the ground, sitting, or simply standing and staring at the house.

As each day passed I became more unsettled. How long were they going to stay? Why were they here? Were they aunt and uncle to the blended family in the wetland area out back? Was my yard the cheap motel they could stay at while visiting? I saw only one pair of geese in my yard this entire time; it was nice they didn’t invite their friends and family over.

I wasn’t about to try to scare them off my property, since I still felt a bit fearful of them. They weren’t harming anything, just silently appearing each morning and hanging around for most of the day. My uneasiness turned into acceptance the first time I saw the geese leave my lawn.

The male, the bigger of the two, tossed his head up and down and gave a loud “whohnk,” telling the female he was ready to head off for the day. He positioned himself at a point in the yard. She looked at him, paused as if to make him wait longer, then walked to his side. They judged the distance for their runway by backing up. He “whohnked” again and she replied with her own “whohnk.” Then he would talk, then she, the repetitions coming faster between them for half a dozen repetitions.

Finally, she would start to run and he started a step after. They ran a short distance, no more than 30 feet, then lifted themselves into the air, she first and he a moment after to guard the rear, all the while still “whohnking” to each other. It was a sight to behold.

Usually they headed off in a southwesterly direction. Once or twice they went southeast. Seeing them take off was mesmerizing. I became like Pavlov’s dog. When I heard the first “whohnk,” I’d race to a front window. Watching them launch never got boring. I had an especially awe- inspiring moment the day I was on the second floor of my home when they took off and barely cleared my three-story house as they flew over. Their feet always hung down until they were over the house and well on their way. I could watch them from the back windows and see them fly for a distance, tuck their feet into their bellies, and “whohnk” until they reached their flying altitude.

Geese mate for life. I envied this pair their camaraderie. One would always be standing guard while the other grazed on clover from the lawn, slept, or walked around. The male seemed to be doing most of the guarding, while the female did whatever she wanted. I wondered when he ate and slept. The birds were always aware of the other. It had to be through body language. I could tell when I was noticed – the stance of the guard goose changed into one of stiffness and staring at me.

They were fun to watch, this couple. I admired the possessiveness of their union, their long-term commitment to each other. Since geese tend to return to places they know, I hope to see them again next spring.

11/29/06

With my busy schedule, it’s hard to find time to do the things that keep me sane. One of the most important things is having time to write. Sometimes I have to get up at 4:00 a.m. to make it a part of the day.

I love mornings and I love writing, but I hate getting out of bed. Lately I’ve had a little friend helping me, a song sparrow I call Freddie. He starts singing shortly after my alarm clock gets mauled into silence.
 
Freddie likes to sit on the duck house that sits right next to my vegetable garden. That’s how he and I became acquainted in the first place. I was sitting barefoot in the sun-warmed dirt a few weeks ago, fussing around my tomato plants. He was making the rounds, broadcasting from all the best perches in his range. How could I ignore this gorgeous little man-bird, singing?

He throws his head back, open mouth to the sky, puffs out his stripey little chest and sings with such gusto you think he might burst. In the middle of one song in particular (he has several variations on each of about five different themes), his little throat pumps like a piston with each note. Sweet Sweet suh-suh-suh-suh swinger…he sings, and then one of the neighbor birds might sing to answer. If he starts a song buck buck buckee, but hears another bird, he stops short and listens. Then he might sing: “I’m singing on top of the duck house”, or “I’m singing in a rose bush in the field.”

Freddie sings from one end of my day right through to the other. Lying in bed the other night, my eyes were scrunched shut against the lingering summer sunshine, but my ears couldn’t shut out Freddie. I began to realize that I could identify the base song, and when he switched to a different one. (It’s not as easy as it might sound. He may sing the same base, but with added notes, a chopped ending, or variations in the middle. They seem classifiable by their beginnings. I’ve transcribed the Do-Wah series, the Do-Wee series, the Buck-Buckee series, the Sweet-Sue and the Sweet-Sweet series.) 

First, he would sing one song 20 or so times, then switch to another for about the same amount of time, then another. Sometimes he would sing each only a few times before switching, as if unsatisfied with the results. At one point though, he stayed on one in particular, which I transcribed Do-Wah Do-Wah sh’bop sh’bop Ringo-o-o-o-o. He sang it almost identically over and over and over again. I wondered if he were having a bit of a border dispute with a neighbor, vocally duking it out. 

It amazes me that simply paying a little attention to one small brown bird can open my ears to so much more in the world. When I first realized I was hearing his songs as something with meaning, without trying to transcribe them or understand them, it was like I’d been touched with a magic wand. Suddenly I felt like scientist and shaman all rolled into one: I had listened and taken notes and watched and listened some more, and I could tell when something was up out there. Fred could actually startle me by singing something out of the ordinary.

More than that though, Fred has given me Song Sparrow Awareness. Weeding a garden 20 miles from here, I hear a song sparrow on his perch and without thinking I note when he switches songs or continues with the same one for an extraordinary length of time, and when he moves from perch to perch in his territory.

I’m going to miss Freddie when he leaves for winter. I wonder if he’ll be back next year. Will I recognize him? Yesterday and today he has been behaving very differently. He has sung only infrequently, and not once in two days have I seen him on the duck house. Early this morning, picking hornworms from my tomato plants, I saw him on the split-rail fence. There were two or three other song sparrows within a few feet of him. I’m guessing this means Fred’s young’uns have fledged. With them gone, he has far less motivation to risk his tail-feathers singing at the top of his lungs on the most visible perch around. I guess I’m going to have to get myself out of bed.

By Kate Goodin, UNH Cooperative Extension NH Outside volunteer                               

08/16/06

For more information call the UNH Cooperative Extension's Family, Home & Garden Center's Info-line (toll free) at 1-877-398-4769 or send us an email. Volunteers are available to answer your questions Monday through Friday 9:00am to 2:00 p.m.

The battle began about eight years when I noticed that almost everyone I knew was feeding wild birds. Articles appeared in numerous nature publications explaining how to feed, when to feed and what to feed to attract the most “desirable” species.

A common blue jay was out, a cardinal was in. The goal was also to make a sighting of a rare bird that had just by-passed your neighbor’s yard for yours. Along with the thrill of recording each new species, I began to feel a moral obligation to save all the feathered creatures in my yard from certain starvation during our cold New Hampshire winters.

My first attempt at feeding was an instant success. I purchased a thistle seed feeder and flocks of gold finches rushed to my deck. The first winter came and went without incident, except for an occasional crash to the deck (me) during those early morning feeder refills. No broken bones, but a few near misses taught me to check for black ice before venturing out on to the deck without my “creepers.”

Unfortunately, a few birds crashed as well. Sometimes, huge waves of birds would take off in an instant and invariably one would hit the window and crash to the deck. Luckily, most of the crashes resulted in just a stunned bird, which I would put into a cardboard box where it could recover. After an hour or two in the box, it would usually be ready to rejoin the flock. There were, however, a few real casualties. I justified each death by thinking of the hundreds of birds I was confident I had saved from certain starvation. Were a few deaths too high a price to pay for the survival of so many?

By spring, I had 20 or 30 birds waiting for their turn at the now two feeders. The male goldfinches were coming into their beautiful gold and black plumage, a truly amazing sight. This first attempt was such a success I increased the number of feeders to include one with sunflower seeds to attract a wider variety of birds. After that, I decided to continue feeding right through the summer.

I read that you must take the feeders in every night once the bears leave their dens in the spring, as they start looking for food, and bird feeders are a quick and easy source. I did take the feeders in every night—well, almost every night. Unfortunately, bears, either with their keen sense of smell or their knowledge of human fallibility, knew exactly the nights I left the feeders hanging on the deck.

One night I awoke to a loud noise. The whole family trooped downstairs to investigate. We found a huge bear on the deck, so large its back was even with the deck railing, pulling down all the feeders. Lights, dog barking—nothing alarmed the bear as he enjoyed the sunflower seeds. I knew when he knocked down the third and last feeder with his powerful paw that I would need to buy more duct tape.

In the past eight years, I’ve lost nine feeders. One time, the feeder with the iron support rod disappeared; I never saw either the eight-foot rod or the feeder again. I still have a graveyard of bird feeders hanging from the rafters in my basement, each in a different stage of repair. Some have perches missing. Others I’ve repaired with duct tape or coat hangers. The ones beyond repair I’ve kept for spare parts. One remains in pristine condition. Why? Because it\s the only one never raided by bears.

Two years ago, I surrendered to the bears and stopped feeding the birds. Although no one single event made me raise the white flag and end the fight, I was moved by the news of yet another bear, accustomed to an easy meal at feeders, shot for invading a human space.

Whatever the reason, I decided to attract birds the way that nature does. I planted shrubs, trees and other plants that will provide the birds with food and shelter.

I doubt I’ll ever hang bird feeders again. As much as I enjoyed seeing a flock of goldfinch taking to wing, or a single golden bird pecking the small thistle seeds from a feeder, I’ve decided to let Mother Nature provide them food as she has done for millions of years.

by Linda Shaw, UNH Cooperative Extension Master Gardener

For more information call the UNH Cooperative Extension's Family, Home & Garden Center's Info-line (toll free) at 1-877-398-4769 or send us an email. Volunteers are available to answer your questions Monday through Friday 9:00am to 2:00 p.m.

4/13/06