Winter, watching woodpeckers #phenology

Goldfinches, in Winter (non-breeding) colors are coming to the feeders. Is that a sign of Spring? Probably not, although it is now only 57 days until the start of meteorological Spring, but who's counting? As befits the weather circumstances, suet and sunflower seeds are disappearing rather quickly with all our below zero temperatures. For reasons we don't begin to fathom, since there still is suet in the front feeder, one of our local pileated woodpeckers was foraging on the ground yesterday. We don't recall ever seeing that before.

pileated woodpecker, ground feeding

Photo by J. Harrington

The Naturalist's Notebook we mentioned the other day suggests that we learn as much as possible about the most common species around us. We think we'll start with woodpeckers, since there are representatives of several species that show up regularly at the feeders. That also seems like a reasonable way to ease into learning about the relationship between woodpeckers and trees whence we can learn more about our local trees. Our beginning list includes:

• Pileated


• Hairy


• Downy


• Red-bellied

which woodpecker worked this wood?

Photo by J. Harrington

There's a wide variety of guides to woodpeckers, including this listing of the seven woodpeckers native to Minnesota, so we won't be short of reference material. There, we bet you're glad we've settled that. This is one more small piece of our never-ending efforts to bring focus to our activities and interests. We've become too much like the descriptions of the Platte River, “too thick to drink, but too thin to plow.”

Birds Again

Jim Harrison, 1937 - 2016

A secret came a week ago though I already
knew it just beyond the bruised lips of consciousness.
The very alive souls of thirty-five hundred dead birds
are harbored in my body. It’s not uncomfortable.
I’m only temporary habitat for these not-quite-
weightless creatures. I offered a wordless invitation
and now they’re roosting within me, recalling
how I had watched them at night
in fall and spring passing across earth moons,
little clouds of black confetti, chattering and singing
on their way north or south. Now in my dreams
I see from the air the rumpled green and beige,
the watery face of earth as if they’re carrying
me rather than me carrying them. Next winter
I’ll release them near the estuary west of Alvarado
and south of Veracruz. I can see them perching
on undiscovered Olmec heads. We’ll say goodbye
and I’ll return my dreams to earth.

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Please be kind to each other while you can.