roving gourmands

We were descended upon by ten crows this morning. They haven't been around in awhile, or at least not when we're home. Their visiting numbers have increased dramatically--from four to ten. I wish I knew what precipitated the addition of members; could it be that as nesting season is about to begin extended family members have been recruited to help out? Or simply the fact that ten pair of eyes are better than four?
A combination of both? The mysteries of the corvid world abound.
Alas, they were gone before I knew it. When I saw them do a 'fly by' to check out the contents of their feeding platform (at the time it was empty of food but full of snow) I high-tailed it to the refrigerator for the bag of turkey-dog slices I had prepared in case they stopped by. To this I added some tortillas, dumped the mess on the perch, and waited. Someone must have been watching (although I saw no crows in the area when I headed back into the house) as they appeared in the cottonwood and bur oak within two minutes. Nine stayed in the trees while the tenth investigated the cache. How, I wonder, did he get the job of investigator? Was he the low crow or the alpha crow? The bravest bird, the senior bird, or the most expendable bird?
Whatever the case, the turkey dogs were rejected. The nosing around ended in everyone leaving, with no delectable hot-dog slices or tortilla bits being taken. This leads me to believe that they must have a better selection elsewhere. Mike says they're not hungry. I think I just need to up the ante. Tomorrow it's fried eggs.

Betrayed

I didn’t believe the weather people when they said it would snow 3 to 6 inches last night. It didn’t seem possible; robins were pulling worms from the ground, doves pairing up, maples blooming, and the world generally felt as though it was marching toward spring. Wrong. We have been left with at least 6 inches of snow; heavy and wet, pulling every tree limb toward the ground. Under the snow branches are covered with the ice that formed before the snow started. On the whole, it is disappointing and depressing, and I am boycotting outside until it can once again be reasoned with. Which doesn’t look as if it will happen anytime soon.

Duck Verbosity

I'm thinking about ducks today. A friend of mine, also somewhat outdoors-obsessed, mentioned seeing a migrating Scaup on a local lake and this has put duck-thoughts into my head. I am contemplating Mallards though, not Scaups. A pair made their first arrival of the spring in my backyard a few days ago and have been back every morning since. When I was alerted to their presence, I ran like a lunatic out to the garage to prepare cracked corn and a huge saucer of water for them in the hope I could get it into place before they left and without scaring them off. I don't know how successful I was since we had to leave for school a few minutes later, but at the end of the day someone had worked over the corn and there was a sludgy corn-mess at the bottom of the water dish. I realize there is nothing particularly compelling, or even interesting, about Mallards arriving to my suburban backyard--unless the rest of the story is considered.

In April of 1995, my husband and I arrived home from a trip to Europe. The morning after we got back, jetlagged and wide awake long before we wanted to be, two Mallards arrived in our yard. At the time, our backyard was a virgin stand of suburban desolation, with tiny trees, new sod, and few birds to watch. Thus, the arrival of ducks was magical and a possible sign that our efforts at rewilding the place were showing some success. We had lived in this house, a pre-fab, slapped-together, charmless box, for a little over a year. In that time we planted a lot of twenty-dollar ( I wanted the $100 eight foot tall ones, but Mike is an optimist) trees, built a vegetable garden, put up a split-rail fence, and generally spent a lot of time dreaming about what things would look like in 20 years.

The Mallard pair did their part by returning every day that spring and I did mine by ensuring there was corn available to them as well as a lot of water with which to wash it down. They appeared religiously for over two months and then disappeared for the rest of the season. I was happy to have had them here but didn't think much more about it.

The following year our son was born and I was lucky enough to be staying at home with him. This allowed me to watch the avian goings-on of that Spring as well. Again, the Mallard pair arrived at about the same time. Or, some ducks were there. I never knew if it was the same pair, but now, after watching ducks return close to the same time each spring and seeing them come every morning, I have questions.

It seems impossible that the same pair is still alive after so many years. I don't know what the lifespan is of a Mallard, but fourteen years seems like eons in the waterfowl world. So, does this mean that different ducks show up in my yard, (now overgrown and as wild as the neighbors will tolerate) every spring? Is it coincidence that they fly in and land in exactly the same spot each morning? The place they choose to land is difficult for aerial navigation to say the least--they come in along the fenceline and under a huge cottonwood tree. There is a large open area between the house and gardens and trees which would provide a far easier landing strip, but they choose the more difficult route each day. Though it's tougher to get to from the air, their chosen spot under the cottonwood, is right where I leave their corn and water. Coincidence? Possibly. But what I cannot shrug off to coincidence is the fact that there is virtually no way these are the same ducks who came in 1995. This leads me to conclude that there must be some sort of communication happening. Did my original ducks covey to others the location of the stores of corn I offered each day? Did these ducks then pass the informational torch to others? How many generations of Mallards have now visited my cottonwood over the years?

There is a good deal of anecdotal evidence as well as solid research regarding the sharing of knowledge in the corvid world. It is no secret that corvids have mental capacities beyond those of other animals, mammals included. Bernd Heinrich''s book The Mind of the Raven, discusses his observation of tagged ravens, with singular knowledge of a food store, communicating to others (at the roost, Heinrich supposes) about the cache. Different birds arrive, without the presence of the tagged birds, the next day to eat the carcass he has left for them. Obviously, discussion of some fashion is occurring somewhere during the daily comings and goings of these birds. But ducks? I don't know how high on the list of brainy birds a Mallard is thought to be, but I assume they don't approximate the intelligence of crows and ravens. Whether or not the same or different ducks show up at my house each spring is really no matter. But the possibility that each pair has been part of a succession of birds sharing knowledge is fascinating to me.

Fourteen years ago, my quarter acre was a veritable wasteland with little to offer any form of wildlife, including starlings. Over time and through a lot of effort, we've managed to give back a little of what was taken. The maligned, scrawny twenty dollar trees are huge, much to my surprise. There is a small pond now, which breeds dragonflies and the occasional mayfly I haul in a Nalgene from the river. Ample bird feeders and more importantly, natural food sources abound for anyone who shows up here. Happily, they do show up. Squirrels nest in our screech-owl box, which distresses me, but they are amusing and give Kola something to do. The starlings are more prevalent than I would like, but they don't keep away the Cardinals, Blue-jays, Wrens, Juncos, or Goldfinches. Robins, who litter the lawn and sing for us every evening, are a reliable presence on the fencepost when I start turning over earth in the vegetable garden and actually wait for me to toss them a worm. It's relatively easy to forget the opossum living under the shed until I am outside late and startle him...and am myself startled by his creepy grin in feigning death. I wish the chipmunks were nocturnal so the owls would start killing them, although the rabbits we lose to the owls are not missed. I would rather, as well, that the Cooper's Hawk only take the Starlings and the occasional Mourning Dove, but he takes the slowest, not the least-liked. No-one bothers the crows who noisily and joyfully announce their dominance from the cottonwood. It is the four of them I am most excited to see when they arrive for a peanut or morning meal of scrambled eggs. It took years of offering them food before they deigned to take it, and they still do so warily.
So although I am completely unable to unravel the mysteries of nature, I am happy to be offered a place within it; though I am sure I will never know whether it is a fourteen year old mallard couple visiting my yard or a pair with amazing communication skills. Either way, I am grateful.

Spring's first full day on the job

Today's gift was the sound of the robins singing their evening songs, and the knowledge that they will be here for the next seven months to grace us with their voices. A good day.

Marching orders

The robins are back, so weary from flying that they walk wherever they go
from Braided Creek
by Jim Harrison/Ted Kooser

Turkey vultures have returned. I caught a glimpse of a pair this afternoon climbing thermals over the woods coursing along the river. The sight of them is reassuring--they'll have a lot to do with a winter's worth of losses in woods and field.
Though the water continues to recede a little more each day there was still a hell of a lot of water to avoid. Each step was taken gingerly, logs were balanced upon, curses were uttered with each misstep until I realized....why am I avoiding being wet? What will happen if I step in, all the way in and up to my knees if I want?
Nothing happened. I got wet. That's it.
Though at this time of year the water hovers in the thick of the river at somewhere around 35 degrees, its edges are a somewhat more palatable temperature. There was a momentary chilly rush but my body quickly compensated and warmth returned. and an entirely new set of possibilities suddenly presented themselves. No longer having to worry about getting wet, the recently downed tree requiring investigation was accessible. A feather floating in the water was within reach. The perfect cottonwood branch, riddled with intricate wormholing, was no longer beyong my grasp. Actual and perceived impediments were gone the moment I invited the river into my boots.
In January, falling in the river proves terrifying--there is no reason for it to be so, but it is nonetheless. Every time I have slipped and gotten a bootful of icy water I am momentarily shocked, horrified, and angry. Yet within minutes I forget about being wet and enjoy the mistake--the line between warm and cold has been perforated and I am liberated from my fear. We should all approach the woods and rivers and fields with same abandon our dogs do--if there's something good to see in the distance, go. A pile of river slash separating you and the hawk bathing in the sun? Figure it out and get there. Spongy wetland between the calling blackbird and you? Hold your breath and get moving.
Our mothers aren't around to tell us not to get wet and besides, when did we listen anyway? We knew, even then, that the perils of wetness, coldness, buckthorns in the leg or bark in the eye were worth the joy of being unencumbered and unrestrained outside. So there ought to be nothing holding us back now.

Farewells

The chipmunks are awake. I think they may have gotten up yesterday as I saw the first of the year perched on a stone at my back door eating sunflower seeds. He certainly did not look the way I would expect after a winter of sleeping--he was fat and spry, not at all sluggish and skinny as someone who has been hibernating for four months.


The river is settling into herself and has quieted in the last week. While I think we're still two weeks from water levels dropping to normal, the shores and woods reclaim a little ground every day. That first day in April I am able to cross over the little creek adjoining the river and into the woods will be a happy one--after a month of no human activity in the area the soil is usually rife with an olfactory motherlode waiting to be gathered and sorted by Kola.


The kingfishers, who have been present but silent all winter, are announcing themselves again up and down the flooded banks. I wonder how easy the fishing is for them since I assume all the fish are low in the water, hugging the mud and gravel on the bottom. I also would like to know how the recently arrived herons are faring so early in their year of fishing--frogs are still ensconced in their blankets of mud, and with the fish still hiding in the depths, what are they eating? But the herons are there, doing their silent stalking--does this mean that there is someone to stalk, or just that they are rehearsing?


Earlier in the winter, on a rogue day of blessed 65 degree warmth, I found a heron lying on its side in two inches of water along the shoreline. His eyes, open and glassy, had either a spark of life left in them or had very recently given up sight forever. I couldn't tell which. His keel was bony and slack, a sure sign that the fishing had not been good. I moved him from the water hoping to spare his body from a serious roughing-up by the coyotes and buried him in the snow under a tree. Why I thought snow would protect him from coyote senses is beyond me, but for short time I did think that. I continued my walk, my thoughts never leaving the possibility of getting him home somehow to be photographed and later buried in the garden. While I knew that he might feed someone sorely in need of a meal, I couldn't stomach the thought of it. I was also more than a little intrigued by the possibility of photographs of those impossibly perfect feathers. Convinced,I circled back and dug him from the snow, stashing his ridiculous length in my sweatshirt and trying to look like I had anything but four feet of heron neatly folded into the fleece over my arm.
I am sure I had seen this very same bird the day before close to where I found him that morning. He was the only heron I had seen since late October, when the last of them lifted into the sky for a trip to somewhere warm for a few months. I thought at the time that it was strange that he was there, prowling the banks as if it were May and not January, and surmised that he must have been a first-year bird, brand-new at wearing his heron clothes and not yet versed in the ritual of migration. Whatever his situation, I hated finding that he had succumbed.
He resides for now in my freezer, waiting for the soil to yield to a spade. I don't know that I made the right choice in taking him with me and away from his home waters, but it's too late now. His spirit, already mingled with the many others lost this winter, does not care. Today, in the new warmth of early spring as I take the river's pulse for another day, I will surely find it there.

The gloves come off.....

And so begin the games of the weather gods. The temps are going to go down to 23 degrees tonight with that relentless March wind ushering them in. This is my warning to all the plant people on their way up and out of the soil; stay where you are. Things are going to get ugly.

Sightings

There were a lot of "firsts" today. First Sandhill Cranes overhead, flying in their convoluted circular pattern, calling all the while. Sometimes, flying thousands of feet up, they can be heard but never seen. It' s maddening to hear them but never get the visual gratification

to match with the sound. Not so today; no mistaking that prehistoric quork and the aerial circle of eighteen for the first time since October.
An appearance of a Snowy Egret on his way to somewhere was also the first this year. They seem vaguely prehistoric as well, their lazy wingbeats and ungainly lumbering through the sky a reminder that birds have been with us nearly forever.
The crows were busy this afternoon. I lost time for awhile, watching them leave a stand of oaks in their cloud of ten, racing to the sun and dropping by twos to the treetops again. Each pair chased one another and sometimes looked as if they were hitching rides, so close did they fly together. Females will be on eggs soon, so maybe they are enjoying the little time they have left to play before the work of nestlings begins in late April and early May. It is conceivable, however, that none of the ten I saw are a bonded and mating pair--each one could have been a member of an extended family group whose job it is to help raise young, but have none of their own. I also learned today that the crows are like humans in that one doesn't bother waiting for another to finish talking before an answer, or possibly a different question, is given. I don't know how they get anything decided when they can't hear each other over all the yelling. Maybe their similarity to humans also includes the propensity our species has to hear ourselves talk and never listen to much. If I didn't need a job that paid me money, I would take my currency in crow stories and follow them around all day. Working in a building seems an enormous waste of energy when time could be spent outside unraveling the mysteries of the local crows.
The rain is supposed to start again tonight. I don't want to see any more rain until the soil is thawed and can absorb some of it. My yard is a mass of spongy puddles and the season of either being wet, muddy, or some combination of both has arrived. But I welcome the mess knowing that soon the world will begin its greening and Spring will be less fickle, choosing to stay for awhile.

Leavings

Last night's river surveillance was disappointing but expected. The rain tally culminated in somewhere around three inches and two days of some form of precipitation alternating between misty drizzle and an onslaught of relentless pouring. The river needs someone to start bailing--the banks are long under water and what was 30 feet wide has swelled to a lake. This makes for interesting navigating for Kola, who prefers obstacles to scale and jump from. There is a maze of trees, some standing (the river now has overtaken the woods) and some fallen and twisted into enormous heaps, floating in a couple feet of water. I always hope for treasures (feathers, old deer bones) to be floating among the junk, but I've not come across anything yet. Milk jugs, plastic water bottles, fishing line, coconuts, pumpkins, and once a plastic bag filled with beans and a fully feathered dead chicken. Kola was giddy at the discovery of the bag and I let her investigate for too long before I figured out what was inside. Eventually she opened it and spilled overly swollen beans and very wet chicken on the bank, reveling in her prize. As much as I didn't feel good about it, I had to give the whole mess a nudge back to its watery beginning to avoid her consuming every bit. I tried not to think about how such a weird package of goods ended up there in the first place. However, flotsam such as that is one of the mysteries of the river.....all the junk that comes downstream came from somewhere, but where? How far away? How long ago? Did the journey begin in here in Illinois or somewhere in Wisconsin? And who lost a coconut?
Some years, after the spring rains, the booty is more natural but just as strange. Last April, it was two beavers, one hung up on a log and expanded to the size of a small bear and the second floating among the bark and riverfoam. Within days it was dragged out and opened by the coyotes, I assume. Kola had a good bath in the mess, but the coyotes gave me a chance to do some impromptu (and smelly) surgery, which resulted in the skull being lugged home. It stayed on the patio table for further decompostion for a few days, but disappeared soon after. I was unhappy, to say the least. What would have been a beautiful addition to the home skull collection was stolen by someone...the coyotes were blamed, but Kola may know the real story.
She has a long-standing argument with the beavers, as do my husband and brother, but theirs is based on some bizarre fishing incidents. Kola just has a general complaint about them, which is seated in their refusal to move out of her way in the water as well as their uncanny tendency to disappear completely after an unnerving tail-slap. Lewis and Clark's dog, Seaman, was bitten in the hind leg by a beaver and almost died from the injury--thus I am wary of allowing Kola to count coup on too many beavers.
Most days she is ready to go for a hike first thing in the morning, long before I am. At this time of year I wait until it's as warm as it can possibly get--while it's great to get the chance to see the coyotes and hear the birds singing their morning songs, 7am is not yet warm enough to enjoy it. As it gets warmer and eventually, hotter than hell, we choose to do our exploring as early in the day as possible. But for now, temperatures are still chilly in the mornings. In November, 30 degrees in the morning is a gift, but by March my tolerance has waned.
On that note, we'd better get to it. We're burning daylight and there are still cooking and cleaning chores to be done after our walk. For now, we're river-bound to unearth the offerings of the day.

"Cold and windy as hell...."

So says my brother after a trip to the San Juan river in his neck of the woods, southwest Colorado. His weather at most times of the year is preferable to ours; sun almost every day of the year, winter temperatures rarely approximating our sub-zero wind chills, and cool nights even when the summer temps are high.
He and I have much the same rituals even with 1300 miles between us.....we visit our respective rivers, his the Animas and mine the Des Plaines, virtually every day. He goes to ply a few trout from the water, and I go to converse with the river and my hound. The differences between the two waters however, are enormous. The Animas is a churning, rumbling, insane torrent, while the Des Plaines is muddy, slow, and generally quiet. I have a hard time thinking at the Animas; I can't seem to locate my thoughts over the roar of the water making its way over the rocks. I am sure EJ thinks a lot while coaxing his fish, but there must be a good measure of diligence involved. After ten years, he probably doesn't even hear it anymore.
One day a few years ago, while stopped at a gas station with my kayak on the top of the Subie, a stranger commented that he couldn't believe I was going to get into the "filthy" water of the Des Plaines river. I told him that the water was only the color of mud because the water flowed over mud. The quality of a watershed can be measured differently at different sites, but the stretch of river that I kayak and walk produces stoneflies, mayflies, caddis, as well as a number of other insects.....the presence of each being an indicator of the good health of the river. While most of the DP water runs over mud, there are sections with sandy and rocky floors, where the caddis and mayflies live until their day comes to float to the surface, ride the water until they've shed their shucks, and take wing. That's when things get sketchy....if they make it out of the water (and often they do not) there are the cedar waxwings to deal with once in the air. But I'll save that story for June, when it is more phenologically appropriate.
I am now thinking I would like to have EJ's input here and see him share this with me, if only voicing his thoughts occasionally, but I am not holding out. He's not a fan of stuff like this, I don't think. I never was either, and am still not sure about it, but for one thing, it's making my convoluted thoughts look a hell of a lot prettier. Vanity.
So this is my invitaion to you brother....we could merge our addled thoughts from each side of the Rockies and call it a conversation. What say you?

Mid-morning ramble

Day two of rain. The red-winged blackbirds are back--a single male appeared in my cottonwood last Monday. A friend tells me that the females should have arrived about a week before the males, but I saw nothing. If they were here, they never caught my attention. I noticed grackles yesterday morning, but have no idea if yesterday was their first day back or if they've been around awhile. I am not a grackle fan. The starlings (damn the starlings) have been relatively quiet all winter, but I can hear them imitating red-tails and blue-jays from their perch atop my chimney. Their voices are echoing down and into the house, and it's making Wakan, our cockatiel, crazy. He seems to think they are talking to him, and maybe they are.
This morning I am thinking about when the insects will start hatching.....I am probably way ahead of myself as none of this is really Spring, just her rumblings. We are bound for more snow I am sure. So, message to all the insects: Stay where you are and wait another few weeks.
Last night while musing over the books to put in my profile list, I got to thinking that two books I love, The Geography of Childhood and Merle's Door, are both better versions of books which made a lot of fuss upon their publication. Merle's Door is the book John Grogan wishes
he had written, and The Geography of Childhood is the story of why children need the woods, but before/without all those children getting to have a disorder, as in Richard Louv's Last Child in the Woods. When we were kids, all those other children, the ones who stayed inside for whatever reason, ( a multitude) were just the object of pity and it never occured to any of us that they might be irreparably damaged. Although, maybe they're the ones who are now running corporations and making a billion dollars, while the rest of us are trying to figure out what the hell happened and why our checking accounts have such small balances. Here's to the woods, and everything she keeps in her pocket.