Noticing the year, first week of March 2009

[urbpan]

This has been a typical New England week in March, with a major snowstorm at one end of it, and a set of perfect springtime days at the end. Reading my friends' list, it seems as the great lakes cities are experiencing something similar. I started the Muddy River photo project, which has had the wonderful consequence of forcing me to find beauty in a landscape I see everyday, covered with a substance (snow) which I have come to hate.

Yesterday I saw my first grackle of the year. It had squeezed its way through the gap in a cage door to help itself to the amenities of a duck exhibit. I forgot to mention that on my last trip to Connecticut (Feb 15th, my mom's birthday) I saw a turkey vulture over the highway. It won't be long until they are year-round in southern New England, and I fully expect black vultures to become common visitors to our area.

The buffleheads and mergansers on the Muddy weren't there yesterday evening, I suspect because other bodies of water have melted through. Leverett Pond looks to have opened up quite a bit. Jamaica Pond is still covered with water on top of slush on top of ice. Dangerous swimming there right now.

Other highlights this week: I flushed out a Cooper's hawk from a bush and was amazed at the speed of its flight. That field marking alone makes it impossible to confuse with a red-tail. Tracking after this storm showed no foxes or coyotes, unlike last time. Hundreds and hundreds of cottontails, some voles (one sick individual which I caught and euthanized) and the usual trails of rats and mice. I'm looking forward to seeing the spring birds again. I haven't seen a junco in a while (but I know they're still out there) and I haven't seen a red-wing blackbird yet (but other Bostonians have reported them).

Comments

[klingonlandlady.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it has seemed to me that there are more bird sounds in the morning at our place, but i can't be sure, or identify them. It does feel like no-longer-dead-of-winter!

[perspicuity.livejournal.com]

red wing blackbirds in the giant meadow area off exit 6 rte 3 nashua.

many fox prints. backtracked to their major local exit. i know of at least two other dens as well. good foxies :>

even see the occasional great blue heron, every few weeks throughout winter. there must be some fishy open water somewhere around here, or they just like to visit.

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[klingonlandlady.livejournal.com]

oh good, i should be watching for the giant redwing blackbird & grackle migration coming down the wetland near us...

[perspicuity.livejournal.com]

esp since last year we had a grackle sanctuary at my complex...

and they went and clear cut almost all the trees, bushes, scrub, etc around the lake area, and removed that major grackle hub (a particularly nice set of tall trees - i'm sure they'll fetch $$$ at some furniture store (that's how these landscapers seem to work - take the valuable timber)) at least i got some pictures.

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[copperwolf.livejournal.com]

Are grackles seasonal in Boston? I didn't see them at all in my hometown in the Southeast, and I've seen plenty year round in the South/west.

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

They are. They're among the first migrants to appear in spring, often in huge flocks. Ours are common grackles only. In the Southwest they have great-tailed grackles, year-round.

[theysuredo.livejournal.com]

I saw my 1st grackle on Sunday in Marshfield! There every spring, en masse, stay throughout what must be their nesting period, then pretty much gone by summer.

A few years ago, I kept finding a birdbath filled with big "bags" of bird poo. Unbelievably filled up to and above the rim one time after a week away. A big mystery ... until one day had the luck to see a grackle land carrying one of these poo-bags and surreptitiously drop it in the birdbath. Apparently they like to dispose of their chicks' droppings in water, anyone heard of this? Only happened that one year, thankfully.