Heavily overcast. A raven flies over with a falsetto croak. A field sparrow circles the house, declaring his territory.
Dave Bonta
April 20, 2025
A cooler sunrise this morning with wind from the north. A ruby-crowned kinglet warbles up and down the scale. A hen turkey picks her way through spring onions.
April 19, 2025
White sun in a white sky. Off in the woods, the tattered white flag of a shadbush in bloom.
April 18, 2025
The sun is at half-power, shining through cirrus clouds, the still-bare branches of oaks and black birches, and the trill of a goldfinch, which shows no sign of stopping anytime soon.
April 17, 2025
Clear and still with frost in the yard and the gibbous moon caught in the treetops like a deflated balloon. A brown creeper sprials up a walnut tree. The sun comes up.
April 16, 2025
A cold wind rummaging through the forest, mixing up the sounds of crows and trains and sirens. The sun appears for a second or two at a time.
April 15, 2025
Two towhees tweet as I drink my tea. Finally they meet at the woods’ edge, tails flared, and one flees. Blue holes appear in the clouds.
April 14, 2025
Against the gray sky, one small dash of yellow at the woods’ edge: a male goldfinch. Nearby, the slow chant of a blue-headed vireo.
April 13, 2025
It’s still cool and overcast, but the daffodils have straightened up and bright spots are appearing in the clouds. A hen turkey walks past, head down, selecting small stones for her gizzard.
April 12, 2025
Cold and heavily overcast. A gray squirrel emerges from the woods like a ghost, seeming to float over the rain-darkened leaf duff, fur the color of the sky.
April 11, 2025
It may be cold, damp, and cloudy, but budburst has come to the old lilac, once again stippled in bright green despite having to re-leaf after last summer’s drought.
April 10, 2025
Sunrise somewhere between showers, cold and sodden, the sky flat-white like the eye of a dead fish. No flies for the flycatchers, no sun for the wren.
April 9, 2025
Below freezing still, and the sky more clear than not. Up on the ridge, a hermit thrush is singing: faint chimes, as if some gate to paradise had a doorbell.
April 8, 2025
A patchwork sky at sunrise with a bitter wind. The daffodils’ cups are all overturned. A few lost snowflakes straggle past.