Cold and clear at dawn. At one point a whippoorwill, screech owl and Carolina wren are all calling at the same time. The owl persists for another five minutes, trilling at the woods’ edge. Then a drumroll from a pileated woodpecker, and it is day.
whippoorwill
A screech owl trilling in the half-dark sounds thinner and more uncertain than usual—a juvenile, perhaps? When it falls silent, a whippoorwill calls, sounding equally tentative, and soon stops. From the woods’ edge, the soft calls of all-night migrants dropping in to rest and forage.
Out early for the moon and whippoorwill, and soon enough the only blue sky we’re likely to see all day. Everything drips. Half-open aspen leaves hang like gray dishrags from the sapling in the yard.
6:24. The cardinal sings a few times and falls silent. 6:26. The whippoorwill calls a few times and falls silent. 6:29. The Carolina wren starts up.
Heavily overcast and still. Two whippoorwills call off to the east. Sunrise is imperceptible aside from a short blast of Carolina wren song.
Night and day overlap as the moon rises through the trees, serenaded by a family of barred owls, while the first song sparrow and cardinal herald the dawn. Then the whip-poor-will begins to shriek.
Fog at dawn, raucous with the calls of a whip-poor-will staking his claim to the woods’ edge, close enough that I can hear him clear his throat.
A whippoorwill interrupted by a screech owl falls silent after three attempts to steal back the stage. When the owl falls silent, a peeper calls.
The last stars gutter in the dawn light. Down-hollow, a juvenile whippoorwill practices its song—only half there.
A few minutes after six, a whippoorwill calls from just inside the woods. At the very same moment, the first mosquito of the day finds my ear.
Cold and clear 40 minutes before sunrise. A shadow flutters in beside the porch and begins to shriek: whippoorwill. When he finally stops, the meadow is alive with twittering.
A catbird running through his dawn monologue is drowned out by a whippoorwill. Fog forms in the lower hollow, extending a ghostly finger into the marsh.
A turkey hunter’s pickup rumbles past. The moon pale as a glowworm glimmers in the treetops as a whippoorwill clears his throat.
In the half-light, the first white blossoms on the old French lilac look like snow. When the whippoorwill pauses for breath, I can hear the first wood thrush’s ethereal song.