A fresh half-inch of snow turns the woods’ edge into calligraphy. Then an inversion layer brings traffic noise, a shimmer of freezing drizzle, the tut-tutting of a Carolina wren.
Carolina wren
Just as my moonlit shadow slips away into the dawn, the Carolina wrens who roost beside the laundry room door start up, with a brassy TEAKETTLE TEAKETTLE TEAKETTLE and her answering SIIIIIIIIIIIIP!
Snowmelt dripping from the eaves. When the sun peeks through the clouds, it becomes a bead curtain. The wren is singing.
In the stillness of dawn, a blood-red stain spreads through the clouds. The winter wren wakes before the Carolina wren for once, with only slightly less strident results.
The sun rises an hour earlier, heralded by the usual motley assortment of sparrows, wrens and corvids. The stratosphere breaks out into a rash of clouds.
Under a gray sky, small birds move silently through green and gold leaves, while the wren yammers away behind the shed.
6:24. The cardinal sings a few times and falls silent. 6:26. The whippoorwill calls a few times and falls silent. 6:29. The Carolina wren starts up.
Another gorgeous, cool morning. Two ravens fly over at sunrise, croaking. A phoebe in the distance is just audible under the usual cascade of wren song.
The coldest morning since May, with an inversion layer bringing sound from the east—the slightly quieter direction. The Carolina wren duets with beeping quarry trucks.
Heavily overcast and still. Two whippoorwills call off to the east. Sunrise is imperceptible aside from a short blast of Carolina wren song.
A desultory dawn chorus of one Carolina wren and a towhee. I consider baring an arm to stop the mosquitoes from whining in my ear.
Windy and cold, with the sun in and out of clouds. The Carolina wren’s usual enthusiasm sparks a red-eyed vireo to call exactly once.
Steady rain with a bit of a breeze—the remains of a hurricane that got the wind knocked out of her and lost her eye. At 7:39 the Carolina wren finally pipes up.
Drizzle. A family of wrens make the sprawling old lilac sing and shimmy.