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Daily short takes from an Appalachian hollow

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woodcock

April 1, 2023 by Dave Bonta

Rain and fog linger from a pre-dawn thunderstorm as the sky brightens. The nasal calls of woodcocks mingle with a torrent of robin song.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags American robin, dawn, fog, rain, woodcock
March 23, 2023 by Dave Bonta

Fog and scattered showers. The last few woodcock peents overlap with phoebes—two of them already, trying to out-sing each other.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags fog, phoebe, rain, sunrise, woodcock
March 16, 2016March 15, 2016 by Dave Bonta

At first light, off in the fog, the weird, nasal calls of timberdoodles. One launches into the air with a whistling of wings.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags fog, killdeer, woodcock
March 30, 2015 by Dave Bonta

Cold with low rain clouds at dawn. Over the noise from I-99, the nasal mating calls of that shoreless shorebird, the American woodcock.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags clouds, woodcock

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On This Day

  • April 5, 2025
    Overcast and quiet, after the drama of a thunderstorm at dawn. The creekside currant bushes have turned intensely green. A hen turkey’s peevish rasp.
  • April 5, 2024
    Dark and overcast at dawn. The creek has subsided—a hubbub rather than a roar. The cardinal who roosts in the red cedar next to the…
  • April 5, 2022
    Sunnier than promised at mid morning. The singers have slowed—wren, phoebe, field sparrow—as if in dialogue with silence.
  • April 5, 2021
    Lust is in the air: a turkey gobbling in the field, a Cooper’s hawk calling in the woods, and right in front of me, a…
  • April 5, 2020
    Again this morning around 10:30, for the fifth day in a row, a Cooper’s hawk calls up in the woods. In the hawk’s mind, it…

See all...

Related book

Cover of Ice Mountain with a linocut of a big ridgetop tree.

What I do after I sit on the porch. One winter and spring's daily walks distilled into short poems with linocut illustrations by Beth Adams.

Header image: detail from Paper Garden by Clive Hicks-Jenkins (used by permission)

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