Thick fog prolongs the early-morning light for hours. The cardinal sings spring while a screech owl quavers over the luminous snow.
screech owl
The soft trills of a screech owl an hour before dawn. I sip my coffee as quietly as I can.
A screech owl adds its quaver to the minimal dawn chorus: mourning dove coos, finch and sparrow chirps. Snow and highway noise on the wind.
Buds swell on the ornamental cherry beside the porch, unaware that porcupines have girdled the trunk. April Fool! You’re dead.
Right after a mourning dove’s song, a screech owl trills at the very same pitch. The sun floats free of the horizon and into the bluest sky.
Thick fog prolongs the dawn light for hours. A screech owl is answered by a pileated woodpecker, dirge giving way to second-line ululation.
At sunrise, a pair of screech owls trill back and forth, one high, one low, as orange-and-purple clouds race overhead.
Gray sky; the smell of rain. Two insomniac screech owls exchange trills. Then the low-frequency thumps of a grouse. An enormous silence.
At mid-morning, the trill of a screech owl. The sun struggles to shine; blurry shadows appear. A crow flies over quacking like a mallard.
Clear, cold, and very quiet. A distant train whistle is picked up and repeated by a screech owl. The incremental progress of the moon.
Screech owls at dawn—a wavering duet. Winged shadows meet for a second in mid-air, then perch in adjacent treetops, ruffling their feathers.