Good morning to everyone on this beautiful Friday! The sun is shining, it is mild at 46F (8C), hard to believe starting the day at that nice temperature considering the way things have been. Yesterday it was sunny and warm, 64F (18C), just beautiful. There is not much bird activity this morning, seems all but 4 redpolls have gone now and they are being replaced by pine siskins returning from the south.

Both birds are the same size and look very much alike, but pine siskins have no red and they have some yellow in their wings and elsewhere. There was only 6 evening grosbeaks as well, plus the chickadees, nuthatches and only 2 juncos this morning. I guess they have gone now too. I didn’t even see any white-throated sparrows, though I did hear one singing very early this morning. A white-crowned sparrow showed up this morning which is nice.

They breed further north so they don’t stay here long and this year their stay with us will be even shorter. So I hope to get some pictures of it today. My 2 fox sparrows have gone now too, they were not around long either. That happens when it is a late spring, birds have to move along faster than normal. Yesterday I checked the path to the river and made it all the way.

Their is a lot of water in 3 spots, but because the ground is still frozen I was able to walk through the water easily without sinking deep like would normally happen. The water was only 2 inches deep where I walked across and my hiking boots are waterproof to about 4 inches. The water was ice cold and there was much ice and snow in that area still. Actually there is still a lot of snow back along the path. One section was 80 feet long with snow 12 to 14 inches deep.

Another section was shorter but the snow was 18 inches deep still. There was large patches of snow like that all through the trees, though mostly it was bare ground. It will take some time to melt all that remaining snow. Today and tomorrow there is supposed to be a strong south wind and mainly sunny so that will help melt that snow faster. But I would not be surprised to see snow back there for another week yet. The river is very high, about 9 feet higher than normal right now, that is a lot of water.

I will talk more about my walk tomorrow. It was a beautiful walk though and except for those 2 sections of snow which I had to walk through, all others I could walk around easily. Among other birds, I saw 18 double-crested cormorants at the river. They are rather comical birds that look like they have ears, which gives them their name. They naturally stayed on the other side of the river. Sigh. But I took pictures anyway. Spring is here and it is beautiful. Have a wonderful Friday everyone and God bless!

Steve and Muffin. (Praying for the people of Ukraine)

©2022 Steve McLeod