Out in time for the tail end of the dawn chorus: field sparrow, red-eyed vireo, pewee, goldfinches, catbird. No more wood thrushes, alas.
field sparrow
Saturday June 05, 2021
Venus in the dawn sky. Phoebe, field sparrow, wood pewee. The alarm-snorts of a deer.
Tuesday April 06, 2021
Overcast and still. A field sparrow’s accelerating note. A turkey hunter and his wife, led by their dog, carry a tree stand into the woods.
Saturday March 13, 2021
The temperature’s back below freezing—the price we pay for such an achingly blue sky. Up by the garage, a field sparrow’s accelerating chant.
Friday June 05, 2020
Overcast. The first milky-white peony is open, facing the road where a sparrow struggles to swallow a large green caterpillar.
Monday May 18, 2020
A field sparrow fresh from bathing and a hummingbird fresh from fighting sit two feet apart on a walnut branch, shaking their feathers.
Sunday April 12, 2020
Faint sunlight. A gnatcatcher’s nasal notes against the background noise of field sparrows. My mother calls to come look at a dead mole.
Wednesday April 01, 2020
Holes in the clouds by late morning. Field sparrows trill almost non-stop. My mother says she can smell my coffee way up in the woods.
Tuesday March 10, 2020
Overcast. A field sparrow’s ascending note. In the dead grass below the stone wall, an otherwise motionless garter snake tastes the air.
Tuesday April 16, 2019
A kestrel lands on a limb at the woods’ edge, looks around and flies off, skimming the ground. The field sparrow barely pauses his song.