wood thrush – The Morning Porch/Patio

Tuesday May 14, 2019

Dave Bonta May 14, 2019

Overcast and cold. I watch a gnatcatcher in action, its chirp after each snap. The wood thrush makes a circuit of the yard trees, singing.

Dave Bonta May 9, 2019

Singers change with the weather: in the mist, wood thrush and cerulean warbler. Scarlet tanager in the drizzle. Indigo bunting in the rain.

Dave Bonta May 1, 2019

Mist. A fragment of blue in the top of an oak that could be a cerulean warbler. From the far ridge, the faint sound of a wood thrush.

Dave Bonta September 12, 2018 2

Home! A migrant wood thrush softly calls over the roar of the rain-swollen creek. In the big tulip tree, a squirrel is building a drey.

Dave Bonta May 4, 2018 2

Cloudy and cool. The great-crested flycatchers are back with their dinosaur calls. From down-hollow, the faint carillon of a wood thrush.

Dave Bonta September 22, 2016 1

Clear and cold at sunrise. A migrant thrush calls from the not-yet-ruined temple of the trees. Overhead, the archaic smile of the moon.

Dave Bonta June 19, 2016 1

Another bright sunny morning—meaning the shadows are deep and full of unseen singers: scarlet tanager, cerulean warbler, even a wood thrush.

Dave Bonta May 12, 2016

Overcast enough that the wood thrushes are still singing at mid-day. The cloying scent of cypress spurge wafts over from my weedy herb bed.

Dave Bonta April 30, 2016

Thin fog. Two wood thrushes skulk around the edge of the yard. A crow finds something hiding in the pines and tries to raise an alarm.

Dave Bonta July 25, 2015

Far off through the woods, the bell-like notes of three wood thrushes—young ones mastering the music of their tribe before they disperse.