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Daily Nature Observations From Your Place 2019
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Windchills of -50° here in northern MN overnight. -47° still late this morning. It's been a cold January! Not a lot of nature or phenology observations this time of year, as most things have migrated or are dormant. Expecting possible record cold again tonight. Excellent reading weather.
Outside the window, a grackle landed on the air conditioner unit next to my bed. It called a bit to its friends and so exited the cats they fell off the bed to get a better look. The sound up close was incredible. So pure and quite different than when one hears bird song with a bit of distance. It stayed there until Schrödinger climbed up in the inner cover and spooked him, but in NY City you take any little bit of nature you can get!
Amanda, I had to go put my big fluffy coat on after reading your windchill! My lord! We could barely deal with below freezing! How do you do it?!
Mod
Mod
Two wood fires, so thankful for them, and for abundant firewood! My biggest grocery challenge is buying produce and getting it home unscathed- when insulated bags won't cut it, I have buttoned up bananas inside my coat with me for the carride!
I love the image of your coat with all the delicate produce stuffed in it. Is that a bunch of banana, strawberry’s and lettuce in your coat or are you just happy to see me?
Mod
Mod
And Amanda-- wow putting produce inside your coat! I love it - what an image. :)
It's been a bitter, cold January here in Ottawa, Ont. too (-27C with windchill at the moment), and we've had about double the snowfall (108cm) of January 2018. Brrr! and I'm finding it more difficult to throw the snow over the high snowbanks. Some beautiful, cold sunny days...good for walking if you're dressed for it, and I love that crisp, squeaky sound boots make on the snow when it's cold. I am enjoying watching the birds at my suburban bird feeder - lots of cardinals, chickadees, white and red breasted nuthatches, hairy and downy woodpeckers, and the occasional blue jay (I love them - they are such clowns and I call them kamikaze pilots when they fly in to the feeder so fast). I was thrilled to see a Pileated Woodpecker at my feeder one day (the first time I've seen one at the feeder) - wow, they are big birds! The squirrels and rabbits are also enjoying the fallout from the feeder. The chickadees are so smart - they come to drink the drops that form on the air exhaust pipe from my furnace.
I watched a group of excited and vocal crows circling around in the air yesterday - couldn't tell if they were mobbing a bird or not.
I'm enjoying the posts from others about their winter observations.
I just moved last year, so I can't compare this winter with last, but here are some observations. I live in Snoqualmie Valley about an hour east of Seattle. I can see farms, ponds and the Snoqualmie River from my window. The river is lined with cottonwoods and big leaf maple trees, which are bare now. There are a couple of juvenile bald eagles that like to hang out in the upper branches of the cottonwoods. I've also seen some hawks. On my balcony, there is a pair of Anna's hummingbirds that come to my feeder. We have migrating trumpeter swans and snow geese in the fields in our valley. I often see the swans flying in groups of 5 or more, trumpeting like crazy.
Mod
Hi Joy:
I am curious about how much snow and weather you have received this year as I am also in the Northwest. And, when did the Anna's Hummingbirds leave? Did they leave?
Mod
When the blackbirds descend onto the platform feeders, the platforms swing and wildly. Older males flick their bright red epaulets and the younger males keep their wings in close.
Mostly, posturing is minimal, because everyone is focused on getting food. The males and the striped females swing side by side.
Only a midnight blue Stellar’s Jay is bold enough to stop in and grab a sunflower seed. The smaller birds keep their distance.
Once the blackbirds return to the elm or the telephone wire, one can see the blizzard feed is not a single species event. English sparrow, house finch, Eurasian collared dove, mourning dove, spotted towhee, golden crowned sparrow, and white crowned sparrow drill for thistle, cracked corn, millet, and sunflower seed. A Northern flicker hits the suet cake. Even a denizen of the prairie the Western Meadowlark sits in a doorway, leading to the deck, watching as snow pours down and covers the grasslands more and more deeply
Snow has been falling so densely the past six hours, that the farmhouses’ exterior window sills are supporting many little birds. The sills are snow free, because we have a hip roof with deep eaves. Miniature-bodied juncos have lined up along all the sills. Their unblinking obsidian jeweled eyes register the environment as the birds rest and conserve energy.
The bleakest bird today is a young Cooper’s hawk sitting bunched and weary on a branch of the old elderberry bush just outside the kitchen window. The raptor might survive another day, if it could just catch one of the small birds flitting about it. But, already the hawk seems past the blizzard feed’s tipping point. The tipping point, the tipping point, the tipping point…
From Oregon
Hi Sher, we have received 4-5 snow storms where it actually stuck, which is very unusual in the lowlands of Puget Sound. One storm left us with 16" of new snow! The Anna's are year-round here. I don't think they realized what they were in for this year! I bought an extra feeder so that I could swap it out when the nectar got frozen, sometimes several times a day. They are tough little hummingbirds!
Mod
Agreed- an unusual winter. We still have a lot of snow on the ground here, and usually this week March 10th we plant hundreds of shrubs, but that would be impossible this year. We couldn't even place an order.
Mod
Here -- almost all the snow is gone. We have had some flooding, but nothing serious. I will be a bit sad to see all the little creeks, which are running full at the moment dry up!
Western bluebirds, killdeer (which nest here), Say's Phoebe have arrived, and any day now the Dark-eyed juncoes will depart. I have just put out my hummer feeder for the season.
Box elder bugs are massed on the barn walls warming in the sun- I suppose and mating too.
I saw a large garder snake yesterday up near the pump house pond. So early to see a snake out, and it was very sluggish. In fact it really did not move as I passed close by in the 4-wheeler.
I am thinking about planting --- I bet some of you are too.
Mod
The red-winged blackbirds and killdeer are back, the cardinals are extremely vocal in the mornings, and unfortunately the skunk and raccoon roadkill has picked up again. Obviously they're still a bit sluggish after their hibernation.
We had ice build up inches thick here over the winter, so there are STILL places where it's thawing and refreezing overnight. I wait anxiously for the grass to start greening up and the ground to get firmer so we can take the horses out for some grazing!
Mod
Yellow is the first color of spring around the farm. The golden blossoms of glacier lily, balsamroot, dandelion, Oregon grape, flowering currant, desert parsley, and buttercup bend in the strong spring winds.
Yellow the first color of spring is visited, or, perhaps, one could say is courted by the stumpy-bodied native bee, the perfectly symmetrical honeybee, and by the comical Oregon bumblebee. My favorite.
Spring singing frogs have quieted down now, but replacing their exuberance is the bright sun of yellow in big clumps dotting the perimeter of our six ponds. It’s wild dandelion, which I’ll never rip out or mow down. The so-called weed is the earliest and richest nectar and pollen available to all the farm’s buzzy-bees.
To start off-- how is winter this year? Can you make a comparison between this year and last winter? What are you seeing right now around your place. Thanks for participating!
Sher