A squirrel climbs the elm with a mouthful of dried leaves, goes into the old flicker hole and turns to face out, ready for other contenders.
Tag Archives: flicker
Wednesday September 12, 2012
A squirrel creeps up to the flicker hole in the dead elm, but another squirrel pops out chittering and gives chase through the treetops.
Thursday June 14, 2012
A black snake leaves the flicker nest-hole and begins a perilous descent of the smooth trunk, a bulge in its midsection from all the eggs.
*
See my blog post on the whole flicker-black snake saga at Via Negativa.
Thursday June 07, 2012
The flickers trade places, and the male, fresh from sitting in the darkness, perches for a few seconds on a dead branch bent like a hook.
Monday June 04, 2012
An intruder—another flicker—quietly descends the elm, pokes its head in the nest hole and is promptly chased off by the current occupant.
Tuesday May 29, 2012
It’s not too hot to fight: a robin drives a chipmunk from the lilac. A minute later, a flicker drives a downy woodpecker off its den tree.
Monday May 21, 2012
A pileated woodpecker lands on the dead elm right beside the flicker den hole and knocks twice. A flicker pokes her head out. He flies off.
Saturday May 12, 2012
A muffled knocking from inside the dead elm. A flicker’s head pops out of a hole and flings a billful of wood chips into the sun.
Saturday May 05, 2012
Thin fog. A flicker is excavating a den hole in the dead elm on the other side of the yard, his head almost disappearing into the tree.
Monday April 30, 2012
Two days before my friend from England arrives, my inner voice sounds like a tour guide: Those are flickers. Hear how they croon their name?
Friday April 22, 2011
The sun glows faintly through the clouds like a coin at the bottom of a fountain. Three flickers bicker above the springhouse.
Friday April 15, 2011
Morning full of the cries of woodpeckers—part ululation, part rusty hinge. Like the sounds the trees make in a winter wind, speeded up.
Monday July 26, 2010
The small cross of a plane against the blue, its distant drone. A flicker climbing the dead elm loses his footing on a patch of sunlight.