The Morning Porch » juncos

The dark-eyed juncos flock to the two...

Dave Bonta — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 15:20:18 +0000

The dark-eyed juncos flock to the two dark wounds in all this white: the plowed road’s bare stone and the thin, quiet trickle of a stream.

Dave Bonta — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 17:39:50 +0000

At the bend of the road where the trail enters the woods, a flock of juncos chittering and picking small stones for their crops.

Dave Bonta — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 15:02:24 +0000

Soggy woods under a gray sky. In the multiflora rose bush, a junco’s tail keeps flashing white as it struggles for a perch among the thorns.

Dave Bonta — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 13:00:09 +0000

White above, gray below—the reverse of the juncos foraging in the ditch among sedges, tear-thumb and asters, calling in small hard notes.

Dave Bonta — Thu, 07 Apr 2011 13:46:43 +0000

Ten blackbirds fly over without stopping. The soft songs of juncos: are they pining for their north woods? It can’t be long now.

Dave Bonta — Sat, 19 Feb 2011 14:39:49 +0000

Just audible over the wind: a junco’s chitter. Leaves lift off from the newly melted forest floor and join a harried flock of snowflakes.

Dave Bonta — Sun, 06 Feb 2011 15:26:15 +0000

There must be open water in the ditch: jay- and sparrow-shaped silhouettes are going up and down the dogwood’s laddered branches.

Dave Bonta — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 13:29:32 +0000

Juncos fill the lilac, nearest cover to an unfrozen section of stream. Five or six at a time they flutter down to drink from the dark water.

Dave Bonta — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 13:08:40 +0000

Juncos hop on the icy snow between the cattails where a rabbit disappeared fifteen minutes earlier, taking the darkness with it.

Dave Bonta — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 13:41:03 +0000

The landscape conforms to the snowbird’s body plan: gray above, white below. Feathery puffs wherever a bird lands on a snowy branch.