Crystal-clear and still at sunrise. Dew drips from the roof. Over by the springhouse, a red squirrel and a Carolina wren are having a free and frank exchange of views.
Carolina wren
Dawn. The thermometer has dropped to 50°F (10°C). Something small and dark disappears into the tall weeds beside the driveway, setting off first one, then the other Carolina wren. It never reemerges. The sun comes up.
Dawn. I wake a wren roosting above the door. The cardinal is already singing—and off in the distance, another cardinal responds. They seem in general agreement.
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.
Hard rain slackening after sunrise. As the drumming on the roofs subsides, I can hear a torrent of Carolina wren song and towhee calls.
A freakishly warm wind seasoned with rain. A red squirrel’s scold-call launches the dawn chorus: phoebe, wren, cardinal, white-throated sparrow. A turkey gobbles.
Five degrees below freezing and half-cloudy at dawn, clearing off by sunrise. The robin is missing in action, offering no competition for the caroling of a Carolina wren.
Dawn. A last glimpse of the moon through the clouds as the torrent of robin song is joined by a cardinal, a phoebe, the wren.
Another crystal-clear dawn. A song sparrow and a Carolina wren are trading licks, following initial solos from a robin and a cardinal, all over the whine of traffic.
The sun! A robin answers the Carolina wren as a pileated woodpecker hammers away at a hollow black walnut tree.
At sunrise by the clock, the ground is still lighter than the sky. The wren who called once at dawn has clammed up. Snowflakes seem to have forgotten all about falling, and fly in every direction except down.
Big winds are rummaging through the treetops for a dawn chorus of squeaks and groans. A bright wedge opens in the clouds. The wren wakes up.
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.
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!