Clear and cool. A migrant wood thrush calls softly at first light. It’s very still. Then the wrens wake up.
Carolina wren
July 21, 2023
Fog at first light. The random percussion of rain dripping off the trees slowly joined by bird calls: pewee, towhee, song sparrow, wren…
July 10, 2023
Clearing after sunrise. A Carolina wren lands briefly on my open book, between two haiku.
June 26, 2023
Thick fog. The wren sings from the other side of the house, seemingly unconcerned by losing two days’ labor when their unbalanced new nest fell out of the rafters.
June 25, 2023
A pair of Carolina wrens have mostly completed a nest in the rafters that wasn’t there yesterday morning, seven feet away from my chair. I love the soft sounds they make to each other as they build.
June 12, 2023
Rain! That unfamiliar whisper rising to the level of a murmur. And a Carolina wren rushing about, making sure the world knows.
May 21, 2023
In the half-light of dawn, a Carolina wren burbles aggressively inches away from my ear. Three fledgling wrens blink awake in the porch rafters.
May 5, 2023
The cold, wet weather has lifted at last! The sun is fulsome and the bird calls glossy, even lubricous. An ovenbird and a Carolina wren sing back and forth, forest to meadow.
April 9, 2023
Clear and cold with the deep quiet that only a major holiday can bring. A distant train. A Carolina wren’s sleepy start to the dawn chorus.
March 18, 2023
The sun guttering below a lid of utility-gray cloud illuminates a small flotilla of snowflakes. It’s quiet apart from one, highly excited wren.
March 14, 2023
The porch is plastered with fresh snow; more flakes fly past without stopping. A Carolina wren holds forth from the heart of a barberry.
February 9, 2023
Nearly an hour past the alleged sunrise, the sky brightens and birds recover their voices, wren and nuthatch synchronizing like some sort of happiness machine.
January 2, 2023
The sound of running water in the darkness. Occasional soft, sparrowy chirps as the sky brightens. Then the wren’s impatience bubbles over.
January 1, 2023
A clearing sky at sunrise with the sound of running water and a wren. The snow is looking threadbare, even on north-facing slopes.