Winter Games

You know when you think you see something, but then look and nothing is there?

So you take a few steps and then, woops, you think you see it again.

I saw a small dark object drop from the sky and disappear into the snow.

Turns out I wasn't losing my mind (whew!)

I realized it was a bird.

A very silly bird.

I couldn't help laughing out loud.

See it peeking its little head out of the snow?

Was there something underneath the snow that I didn't know about?

Was it playing?  Or hiding?

While I'm waiting to see what it will do, a Common Redpoll lands beside the hole with a sunflower seed in its mouth.

It stays a moment and then leaves.

Two seconds later, another bird lands (I'm not sure it is a Redpoll.)

I start to wonder:

#1 What is so attractive about this hole?

#2 What is that little bird doing under the snow all this time?

This second bird also stays a moment and leaves.

Finally Mr. Mysterious re-emerges from his hiding place.

He takes a look around,

Springs out from the hole and flies away!

You can see his tail-feathers on the right side of the photo below.

Maybe I've just witnessed an elaborate bird version of "winter hide-and-seek."

I have a feeling Mr. Mysterious is going to win :)

Who Knew?

What do you do with hazelnuts that have gone stale?

Put them out for the squirrels...

But, it wasn't the squirrels who came to eat them.

Who knew that Bluejays love hazelnuts?

They looked so happy!

They grabbed them.

They called their friends.

They tried to take as many as they could hold!

When I saw them swallowing the nuts whole,

I became a little worried.

Gulp!

I hoped I wasn't going to be inadvertently responsible for killing them :(

Not to worry.

I watched them fly up to a nearby tree where they regurgitated the nuts and pecked them into smaller pieces.

Before long, they'd eaten every single nut.

All that remained were their footprints in the snow.

Bold Strokes

I love to draw,

but I'm terrified of making mistakes.

This lack of confidence

results in timid, pale, sketchy lines.

Nature has no such fear.

She draws with bold strokes,

with confidence,

creating works of art that stand the test of time

and are an inspiration.

Summer Daydream

Am I getting tired of winter?

Not really.  I don't mind the whiteness, the quiet, the cold.

 In the fall, plants fade into a calming palette of soft earth tones.

Before long there is no colour at all.

Plants are hollowed, crumbled, gone altogether.

Winter arrives just in time, sprinkling us with fairy dust,

sweeping us into a land of enchantment.

We are so dazzled, the colours of summer fade from our memories.

Didn't the land always look like this?

But then, out on a walk I hear a burst of foreign sounds:

Quaaaaaaack, quack, quack, quack

Splaaaaaash, splash

Flap and flutter

Bobbing in the the water, I see greens, yellow, whites and honey-browns,

and the memory of summer rushes back.

There is sound, movement and colour, all competing for my attention.

What's going on?
Has summer melted the winter away?

Don't be silly, it is only January

and winter hasn't even begun to bite :)

The pictures above don't show that the water these ducks are in is surrounded by ice and snow.  They chose not to migrate and spend their day huddled in or around the rather small hole in the ice.

Maybe next year they'll make a different choice.

Sweet Slumber

Shhhhhh...  Summer is still sleeping.

Camera Knows Best

There is a touch of melancholy to this time of day,

a sense of the end,

as if the light touches everything for the last time.

I stopped to capture the moment with my camera

when a funny thing happened...

This is what I found in my viewfinder.

My fingers halted their movements to focus the shot any further.

I let the light chase away everything but this moment;

This moment filled with magic.

Like an impressionist painting, this shot captured the sensation of the light instead of the details.

I have a very smart camera :)

The next time you're out for a walk

and the sun is playing peekaboo with you,

let it get your attention.

It has a little magic to share with you.

Wintery White

When it really starts to snow, 

when the heavens open up and blanket the land in icy whiteness,

what kind of tree are you?

Do you tip your face to the sky telling each snowflake, "come to me!"

Do you collect it in your arms until you can hold no more, 

and you look like you're covered with baby polar bears?

Or, maybe you're more of a "shake it off" kind of tree.

You like snow, just not on you

and prefer to stock up on snowballs, waiting for the fun to begin.

Then again,

maybe you're the kind of tree

that's happy it will never see a day of snow -

Ever!

Chop! Chop! Chop!

I heard them long before I saw them.

Chop, Chop, Chop!

A pair of Pileated Woodpeckers.

This is the female, which can be identified by the black line from her bill to her throat.  In adult males this line is bright red.

As a former migraine sufferer I cringe as their beaks hammer

back and forth into the frozen bark of the tree.

The chopping sound echoes through the forest

making me think of olden day lumberjacks hard at work.

Strips of displaced bark are removed and flung aside,

where they spiral to the forest floor.

It was only in examining my pictures that I noticed its needle-thin tongue darting in and out of the tiny insect holes hidden under the bark.

People incorrectly believe these birds are hurting the trees they hammer away at.  In reality they help control many insect populations that would otherwise create much bigger problems for the rest of the trees in the forest.

Here is a video I took of the woodpecker in action!

An Invitation

You have been invited to a special event.

On this very cold day,

 the second day of the New Year,

the forest glitters with the lights of a thousand candelabras.

 Silverware has been polished and is out on display. 

Lights have been set to maximize the sparkle and shine.

Winter has decorated with her finest accessories and invites you to join her outside and share in her celebrations.