Who’s awake? Me too!

Naturally

  Painted lady butterfly and bumblebee welcomed the morning.

  I saw no chickadees in the yard. I saw none at my feeders all winter. I miss these tiny ambassadors of avian ambrosia.

  “Who’s awake?  Me too!” had heralded the night’s darkness. A series of five rhythmic, muffled hoots from the woods surrounding the house. It was a great horned owl.       

  When I was a boy, I heard someone described as not worth a hoot in a hailstorm. When I heard all the reports of damaging hail, I’m glad I got the hoot instead.

  I went for a leisurely meander where I was verbally assaulted by a goose, intent on beginning a nest. I admired the beauty of hepatica, bloodroot, Virginia bluebells and Dutchman's breeches. These early flowers depend upon ants for seed dispersal. The leaves of Virginia waterleaf (which appeared water-stained) provided more entertainment for my eyes.

  A song sparrow serenaded my stroll. The bird is recognized by a song beginning with three short notes followed by a longer, lower note, closely mimicking the iconic "da-da-da-dum" opening of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony.

  An eastern cottontail rabbit built a nest in a flower bed near the house. It’s a shallow cup scraped into the soil, lined with fur and dried vegetation. Rabbits nest in unusual locations—the middle of a lawn, along a sidewalk, on a playground or in a garden. To avoid attracting predators, the mother visits her kits only briefly at dawn and dusk for quick feedings. She conceals the nest with dried vegetation between feedings.

The Feather Wars

  I enjoyed reading “The Feather Wars: And the Great Crusade to Save America's Birds” by James H. McCommons. It’s an expansive account of bird conservation that chronicles the sky-darkening flights of passenger pigeons in the 19th century that were so overwhelming that they caused people to drop to their knees in prayer. The pigeons created a continuous sound of thunder and buffeting winds from their wings, turning day into dusk. Descriptions noted that the flocks brought a startling power that felt like a "great wind, the rumble of a tsunami, or the tremor of an earthquake." Then the bird became extinct.

  Birds of many species gave their lives so that feathers might adorn women’s garments.

  The book related the story of Charles Bendire, a 19th-century US Army officer, known for his work in oology (the study of birds' eggs). While collecting eggs, Bendire had a delicate egg in his mouth for safekeeping while he climbed, and it became stuck. In his efforts to pry his mouth open to free the egg, he broke one of his teeth. The egg, identified as belonging to a zone-tailed hawk, survived and is preserved at the Smithsonian.

  I found the book wonderfully worthy and absorbing.

Q&A

  Mike Bonner of Courtland asked if grape jelly is OK to feed orioles. Grape jelly isn’t likely harmful in small amounts but doesn’t provide the nutrients orioles need. Think of it as a snack or dessert, not an entree. It’s OK to provide in a shallow dish about 1 inch deep during peak spring migration. Smaller amounts are less probable to spoil in hot weather or get sticky residue on feathers. Organic, natural or bird feeding store grape jelly is better for orioles because it avoids high-fructose corn syrup. Orioles enjoy sliced oranges and drink nectar made of one part granulated white sugar to four parts non-distilled drinking water. Heat the water if necessary to dissolve the sugar.

  “Why do I see so many deer in my residential neighborhood?” Deer are found in such areas because the landscapes provide an ideal habitat with abundant food, limited hunting and few natural predators. Safety and high-nutrition resources are attractive to deer. Wooded areas and parks provide cover, resting places and travel corridors.

  “How much can a wild turkey eat?” A single adult wild turkey is an opportunistic omnivore that can eat up to one pound of food per day, with consumption rates varying by age, sex and season. Hens typically consume about one-third of a pound daily, while toms can eat between half a pound and a pound, increasing intake to build fat reserves during fall. Insects, such as grasshoppers and beetles, make up a significant portion of a poult’s diet in summer. Wild turkeys generally travel 1 to 2 miles per day foraging for food, though they can travel up to 5 miles in a single day depending on habitat and food availability.

  Ken Nelson of Clarks Grove wondered if there was a way to discourage common grackles from feeders. Switch to safflower or striped sunflower seed, or use caged feeders with small openings to restrict access. Use weight-sensitive feeders that close under a grackle’s weight.

Thanks for stopping by

  “The world is mud-luscious and puddle-wonderful.”–E.E. Cummings.

  “Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, snow is exhilarating; there is really no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather. —John Ruskin.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

The name junco has Latin origins, meaning "rush" or "reed." It derives from the Latin word "juncus," referring to various types of reed-like plants—an odd name for a bird not partial to that habitat. The scientific name for the dark-eyed junco is Junco hyemalis, which translates to "winter rush" or "winter bunting." Many here call it a snowbird. Photo by Al Batt.

Troubling tree sparrows?

Naturally

  “The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new.”

  Samuel Beckett wrote that in 1938.  "Nothing new under the sun" is a phrase from Ecclesiastes, suggesting that human nature, life experiences, and core events repeat throughout history, making true novelty an illusion. I’m not disputing anything written in the Bible, but with our varied weather, everything is new under the sun—and under the clouds.

  A beautiful morning gave a beautiful voice to the birds.

  By April 3, more than 20 baby owls had been admitted into The Raptor Center’s hospital since March 3rd. The earliest spring baby arrivals at TRC’s raptor hospital are great-horned owls. A barred owl, found stuck to ice in the Twin Cities metro area after a weekend blizzard, arrived on March 17. The young owl was reunited with its parents and siblings after healing from its wounds. The next day, an eastern screech owl chick fledged too early. It was healthy and returned to its nest cavity the same day. In the past 10 years, only two young screech owls were admitted in mid-April (in 2015 and 2020) with the rest of the young screech owls admitted in May at the earliest. The parents of this one started nesting early.

 The International Owl Center’s JR the eastern screech-owl has had plush toys for 8 years. Rarely, an owl will eat a small piece of a toy, but it comes out with the next pellet. One day, JR was not his normal self. He hadn't eaten his food from the night before, which was out of character for him. Security camera footage showed he had eaten the entire wing of a bird toy, which was about as long as he was tall. JR went to The Raptor Center in St. Paul where radiographs confirmed the giant piece of plush in his stomach. The toy’s wing was removed by the use of an endoscope. JR went home, where the good people at the International Owl Center (in Houston, Minnesota) said he sang (albeit a little hoarsely), and his appetite had returned. I hope JR has lost his appetite for toys.

Wesley the Owl

  While on the subject of owls, I read, “Wesley the Owl: The Remarkable Love Story of an Owl and His Girl,” a memoir by Stacey O'Brien about her 19-year relationship with Wesley, an injured barn owl she adopted. Their years together required O’Brien to provide 28,000 mice for Wesley’s dining pleasure. The author wrote that a barn owl could accurately locate a mouse under 3 feet of snow by homing in on the rodent’s heartbeat. The book chronicles their unique bond, discoveries about owl behavior and intelligence, and how Wesley helped O’Brien through a life-threatening illness. The book is heartwarming and engaging.

The Hall of Fame

  I am a proud member of Ray Brown’s Talkin’ Birds Hall of Fame. I’d been enshrined into the living category of that HOF. That is the one to be in.

Q&A

  Nelson Miller of Ohio asked if Eurasian tree sparrows were going to be troublesome for bluebirds. In 1870, a shipment of birds from Germany was released in St. Louis, to provide familiar bird species for newly settled immigrants. That shipment included 12 Eurasian tree sparrows. These chestnut-capped, white-cheeked arrivals prospered in the hedges and woodlots of the region, spreading through parts of Missouri, Illinois and Iowa. Now I see them in my yard. Unlike its relative, the more aggressive house sparrow, it isn’t a bird of the cities, preferring farms and wooded residential areas. They do compete with native cavity nesters, such as bluebirds and chickadees, but as to how big a problem they might become—time will tell.

  In 1958, Mao Zedong launched a campaign in China to eradicate that species to protect grain crops. That plan backfired. Without sparrows to eat them, insect populations surged, leading to crop failure, and when combined with adverse weather, led to a catastrophic famine that killed millions of people. China imported sparrows from the Soviet Union to restore the ecological balance.

  Steve Weston of Eagan, the Christmas Bird Count compiler for Minnesota, said this about the last CBC: “The story of the count was the 28 Eurasian tree-sparrows found on 5 counts. This is up from 3 birds a couple of years ago, which shattered the ‘casual’ designation of the species at the time. Later counts at a couple of the sites indicated that even these numbers were a fraction of the birds at these locations.”

Thanks for stopping by

  “When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive. To breathe–to think–to enjoy–to love.”—Marcus Aurelius.

  “Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful we must carry it with us or we find it not.”—Ralph Waldo Emerson.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

They are called barn owls because they tend to nest, roost and hunt from structures like barns, silos and church steeples. Barn owls appear ghostly white when gliding over the landscape at night. The heart-shaped facial disc acts like a satellite dish, funneling sound to the ears, allowing an owl to locate prey in darkness. Barn owls don't hoot; they screech. Nicknames include: ghost owl, monkey-faced owl and steeple owl. Photo by Al Batt.

Thrilled by seeing a dandelion

Naturally

  It’s spring when the first dandelion is a thrill and sneezing is a sign of spring to many.

  Near a wetland, I listened hard to a marshing band, but I couldn’t tell how far a frog can jump by its croak.

  April Fool’s Day brought the full, Pink Moon, named for the early spring bloom of a native wildflower of eastern North America, commonly called creeping phlox or moss phlox.

  Sidewalk anthills appear in early spring, shortly after the ground thaws, as pavement ants repair tunnels and expand colonies, pushing sand and soil to the surface. The small, volcano-shaped piles are routinely seen in concrete cracks.

  Pinfeather leaves appear on trees while Dr. Killdeer calls out his name and Frasier Crane (a sandhill crane) flies overhead. Flying V’s join the crane in the sky—turkey vultures.

  I watched a brown creeper spiral up a tree trunk, using its stiff tail feathers for balance. The small bird with a streaked brown back is an insectivore probing bark crevices for spiders, insects, pupae and eggs. It completed its spiral, then flew down to the base of another tree to climb. They rarely come to feeders.

Michigan Bluebird Society

  I had the pleasure of speaking at the MBS Bluebird Festival at a college in Ann Arbor. Speakers offered helpful hints for bluebird landlords. Barnyards where livestock is fed aren’t recommended sites for bluebird boxes because those areas are attractive to house sparrows. To reduce competition from house wrens, locate boxes at least 100 feet from treelines and shrubs. Because bluebirds are territorial and won’t allow other bluebirds to nest close to them, locate nest boxes at least 100 yards apart. If tree swallows use the boxes, put up boxes in pairs 15 to 25 feet apart. The swallows will defend both boxes from other swallows but will tolerate the presence of bluebirds in the second box. Bluebird houses can be mounted on a metal pipe/pole using pipe clamps—materials found in the plumbing section of a local hardware store. The pipe clamps should be attached above and below the nesting chamber of the house. A smooth, round pipe is the best and simplest mounting system. An ideal pole is a 1/2-inch electrical conduit. Metal poles can be polished with steel wool and coated with carnauba wax. The easiest and best type of predator guard to put on the pole is a cylindrical metal stovepipe-shaped baffle with a metal top with a hole in the middle, through which the pole goes. The metal baffle rests on a collar clamped onto the pole. The baffle should be made of galvanized steel or heavy-duty aluminum. This prevents squirrels or raccoons from chewing it and making it easier to climb. The cylinder should be a pipe baffle between 6 and 8 inches in diameter for maximum effectiveness. The top of the baffle needs to be solid with minimal gaps between the baffle and the pole. This is to prevent chipmunks or snakes from squeezing through the gap. Place the boxes at least 50 feet from bird feeders and houses. Raccoons are the biggest concern for many bluebird landlords, although cats and squirrels can be problems. Hawk attacks cannot be prevented. Deterring cats is difficult, because they leap at the adult bluebirds as they leave or enter the box. Cats can jump over 5 feet high. A cone-shaped baffle of at least a 30" diameter put on top of the cylinder baffle could help. Mealworms should be used as a supplemental treat, not a diet staple, and fed in limited quantities (100/day per pair) to avoid nutritional imbalances. They’re best used during the winter or in harsh weather. Bluebird boxes should face away from large bodies of water to prevent fledglings from flying directly into the water and drowning on their first flight.

Q&A

  “Where do flying squirrels nest?” They glide up to 80 yards using a special skin membrane and nest in tree cavities or large dreys built high in trees. Dreys are balls of twigs and leaves that keep the squirrels safe, dry and cozy. Moss serves as insulation. As winter approaches, squirrels move from dreys into tree holes.

  Kathryn Sloan of Mankato asked what else sounds like a mourning dove. A common mnemonic of the Eurasian collared-dove is a persistent, fast "Col-LARRRED-dove" or "who-WHOO-who," unlike the slow, mournful "Huu-lah, hoop-hoop-hoop" of a mourning dove.

  “Why are tree swallow populations declining?” It’s a combination of reduced food availability (aerial insects), pesticide exposure, climate-driven habitat changes, and challenging weather, resulting in a roughly 30% decline from 1966 to 2019.

Thanks for stopping by

  “I step outside each day with the intention of being blown away by something ordinary.”—Rachel Wolchin.

  “In this life we cannot always do great things. But, we can do small things with great love.”—Mother Teresa.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

Common mergansers are large, fish-eating, diving ducks nicknamed "sawbills." Because they’re primarily piscivorous, they are sometimes called “fish ducks.” A male has a dark green head, a white body and a black back. A female has a gray body and a reddish-brown head. They have slender red bills with serrated edges, and nest in tree cavities. “Merganser” comes from the Latin and translates to “plunging goose.” Photo by Al Batt.

Never shake hands with a great horned owl

Naturally

 A melodious whistling came from a male cardinal wearing his Sunday best.

 The robins were noisy; the chorus frogs were noisier. A flock of red-winged blackbirds, common grackles and brown-headed cowbirds swept from tree to tree. It was a giant reunion of birds.

 An owl made a personal appearance in my yard.  Being an owl is what owls do for a living. A great horned owl's eyes are so enormous relative to its head that if human eyes were of similar proportion, they would be the size of oranges. Owl eyes make up as much as 5% of these birds' total body weight. That may not sound like a lot, but for comparison, my eyeballs are about 0.0003% of my total weight. The grip strength in the great horned owl’s feet is 200 to 500 pounds per square inch. An average man’s handshake is 80-100 PSI.

Q&A

 Jack May of Mankato asked if the red-winged blackbirds covering the lawns in March are finding anything to eat or just passing the time practicing. The red-winged blackbirds on our lawns are likely foraging for leftover seeds and early-season insects. They visit farm fields to consume seeds from grasses, weeds like ragweed and cocklebur, and waste grains like corn. As the weather warms, they begin hunting for protein-rich insects such as beetles, caterpillars and spiders. They’re good at finding food. They have to be. At feeders, they are drawn to cracked corn, millet and sunflower seeds scattered on the ground.

 “What bird makes the biggest nest?” There are a few contenders. The southern Africa region is inhabited by a small bird (5.5 inches long and weighing an ounce) called the sociable weaver, which builds community nests. The social weaver is known for its elaborate nests built on trees and other tall structures like utility poles. The birds weave the nest branch by branch and twig by twig to construct huge nests that have separate chambers. A nest can reach 23 feet wide, weigh as much as 2,000 pounds, and have over 100 chambers housing 100 families or more. White stork nests are massive structures measuring 3 to 7 feet in diameter and 3 to 10 feet in height. These nests are built from branches, twigs, straw, grasses, rags and paper, and because they are reused and added to annually, they can weigh over one ton. Each spring, returning pairs across Europe add new layers of material to the existing structure. Because of the size and weight of their nests, storks choose sturdy platforms such as rooftops, chimneys, electricity pylons and large trees. Golden eagles build large nests 2 feet deep and 5 to 6 feet wide. The largest golden eagle nest on record was 20 feet tall and 8.5 feet wide. A typical bald eagle nest is 4 to 5 feet in diameter and 2 to 4 feet deep. A nest could weigh 1,000 to 2,000 pounds. The largest bird nest ever recorded was a bald eagle nest found in St. Petersburg, Florida, in 1963, measuring 9.5 feet in diameter, 20 feet deep, and weighing over 4,400 pounds (over 2 tons). Bald eagles are known to build the largest, heaviest nests of any individual bird pair, and expand the structure over many years.

 “I was in your group tour in Kansas and saw black-bellied whistling ducks there. Are they common?” Black-bellied whistling ducks have rapidly expanded northward from their core range in Mexico and South Texas since the 1970s, establishing populations as far north as Wisconsin and Nebraska. They are becoming more common during warmer months in Kansas. These tropical, long-legged ducks with pink bills and whistling calls, frequently nest in Kansas, using tree cavities and artificial boxes. The ones we saw were near Ellinwood, between Cheyenne Bottoms and Quivira NWR. They typically migrate south to Mexico or the Gulf Coast for the winter.

 “What do flying squirrels eat?” The southern flying squirrel is a native, nocturnal species found throughout Iowa, generally inhabiting mature oak-hickory forests. Minnesota has the northern flying squirrel, which finds the northeastern Arrowhead region a suitable habitat, with a mix of coniferous and deciduous trees. Southern flying squirrels are most common in Minnesota’s eastern counties—wherever there are sufficiently large numbers of hardwood trees like oak, maple and hickory. Their populations do overlap.  The chipmunk-sized squirrels eat nuts, seeds, berries, fruit, fungi, buds, beetles, moths, insect larvae, spiders, bird eggs and nestlings, baby mice, shrews, lichens and carrion. They don’t hibernate, so they cache food for winter.

Thanks for stopping by

 “He who laughs most, learns best.”―John Cleese.

 “There is a quiet light that shines in every heart. It draws no attention to itself, though it is always secretly there. It is what illuminates our minds to see beauty, our desire to seek possibility, and our hearts to love life.”–John O’Donohue.

 Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

In American crow populations, older offspring help their parents raise new chicks for a few years, and this could include as many as 15 individuals, with offspring from five different years pitching in. They feed the young, defend the territory and the nest, stand guard while other family members forage, and feed their mother while she’s sleeping on the nest. American crows lay a clutch of 3 to 9 eggs, with 4 to 6 being most common. Photo by Al Batt.

I was brought up right, but I had left home without a jacket.

Naturally

  I was brought up right, but I had left home without a jacket.

  It was a beautiful March day. Spring had sprung. March can leave humans befuddled, but birds become twitterpated. The most exuberant songsters in the yard were the cardinals, house finches and Eurasian collared-doves. The squirrels still wished their coats had pockets. Killdeer yelled their names.

  Then the band showed up. A couple of trees in the yard became blackbirds. A flock of red-winged blackbirds is commonly called a cloud or a conspiracy. They are a boisterous bunch, for sure. Their merriment is restorative. They depend on photoperiods (increasing day length) to trigger their hormonal shifts for spring migration, but they use temperature to determine the precise timing of their return. Red-winged blackbirds are polyglots able to understand the vocalizations of other birds. When researchers played a warning call used by yellow warblers to signal the presence of a parasitic brown-headed cowbird, the redwings reacted and went on full alert. Red-winged blackbirds visit bird feeders offering sunflower seeds and cracked corn.

  A friend called to tell me his lawn robins had returned and brought spring with them. He recognizes two kinds of American robins—winter robins and lawn robins. A winter robin isn’t his harbinger of spring. He said, “I’m not all tore up about spring being here.”

  I watched sandhill cranes and a pair of trumpeter swans fly over. Species like cranes, geese, ducks and swans fly with their necks outstretched. Herons and egrets fly with their necks pulled back in an "S" curve. Trumpeter swans were extirpated from Iowa and Minnesota by unregulated hunting for feathers and meat, combined with wetland habitat loss. The last native breeding pair in Iowa nested in 1883, and they disappeared from Minnesota around 1885. Successful restoration programs that began in the 1960s-1990s, restored the population. Kudos to the clever work of many people.

  One of my favorite children’s novels is “The Trumpet of the Swan” by E.B. White about Louis. I am a huge fan of E.B. White, and he penned a wonderful story of a trumpeter swan born without a voice, who overcame his disability to win the love of a swan named Serena. A treasured book from my boyhood was “Charlotte's Web,” a classic children's novel about the friendship between a pig named Wilbur and a barn spider named Charlotte, who saved Wilbur from slaughter by writing messages in her web.

  March’s generous moisture will create temporary vernal ponds that will make frogs happy. Frogs are happy with the water and with the ability to eat what bugs them.

Q&A

  “Do both members of a pair of great horned owls and bald eagles incubate the eggs?” The female great horned owl begins brooding immediately after laying the first egg. The clutch size ranges from one to four eggs, rarely five, with two being the most common. Only the female has a brood or incubation patch, which is a featherless area on her abdomen designed to keep the eggs warm. The eggs are incubated for 30-37 days. The male delivers prey to the female. Hatching is asynchronous, often two days apart. Bald eagles begin incubation after the first egg is laid. Both sexes have brood patches, although the female's patch is more well-developed than that of the male. The incubation period is generally 35 days, with the female doing the majority of the incubating. Hatching is usually asynchronous, with 1 to 4 days between eggs hatching.

  “How many birds are named after a city?” There is no Minneapolis magpie or Des Moines duck, but there is the Nashville warbler, Cape May warbler and Philadelphia vireo. These birds were named by early naturalists who typically first identified or documented the species in those areas. “Whoa, wait up just a second, birdbrain. What about the Baltimore oriole?” I hear you. A fair point. Baltimore is a city and an oriole is a bird, but both the bird and the city were named for Lord Baltimore. The bird’s orange-and-black plumage matched the colors of the heraldic crest of Cecil Calvert, known as Baron Baltimore or Lord Baltimore, who founded Maryland. The major league baseball team, the Baltimore Orioles, was named after the bird, which is also the state bird of Maryland.

  “How do squirrels find buried acorns?” A squirrel has a rocking spatial memory, a keen sense of smell, and a treasure map.

Thanks for stopping by

  “You can sometimes count every orange on a tree but never all the trees in a single orange.”—A.K. Ramanujan.

  “We open our mouths and out flow words whose ancestries we do not even know. We are walking lexicons. In a single sentence of idle chatter we preserve Latin, Anglo-Saxon, Norse: we carry a museum inside our heads, each day we commemorate peoples of whom we have never heard.”—Penelope Lively.

  Do good. 

©Al Batt 2026

This bushytail is taking a walk on the dark side. Black squirrels aren’t a separate species, but are a melanistic color variant of the eastern gray squirrel. The dark fur is caused by a genetic mutation (melanism) that offers a thermal advantage, giving the squirrel a leg up on surviving cold winters. A black squirrel will be coming to a tree near you. Photo by Al Batt.

I was traveling the 37-degree isotherm

Naturally

  Winter casts a giant shadow, and we can never be certain when winter will storm out of the room, but we can find hope in signs of spring. Red-winged blackbirds return—the males before the females—and post themselves on territory, where they call “look-at-me.” It’s said that American robins need three snows on their tails before it is truly spring. The robins that went south return in the spring to follow their food sources—earthworms and insects—as the ground thaws. They track a 37-degree Fahrenheit isotherm (a line connecting areas with similar temperatures) to find areas where soil warms enough for worms to surface. Their northward journey is driven by food availability and the need for nesting, rather than by temperature, although they travel according to that 37-degree isotherm. Spring brings the need to stake out breeding territories, often before the snow has disappeared. Robins sing "cheerily, cheer up, cheer up, cheerily, cheer up" to establish these territories. Look for eastern bluebirds, killdeer and common grackles. Common mergansers, buffleheads, ring-necked ducks and wood ducks find open water. Cardinals offer their spring songs. They are clear, high-pitched whistles that sound like "what-cheer," "cheer-cheer-cheer" or "birdie-birdie-birdie." The spring song of the white-breasted nuthatch is a rapid, nasal, low-pitched series of notes described as "what-what-what" or "why-why-why." Black-capped chickadees shift from their "chick-a-dee-dee" call to a clear, two-note "fee-bee" whistle; a song that says, “Spring’s here.” The bugling calls of sandhill cranes are heard. Woodpeckers are like that junior high kid who wanted to be Ringo Starr and drummed on anything that made a resonant sound. Woodpeckers drum on trees or metal chimneys. Tiny snow fleas (springtails) appear on top of melting snow on warm, sunny days. Ground cover, like creeping Charlie and weeds, starts turning green. It becomes nearly impossible not to notice the red osier dogwood (redstem or red-twig dogwood). Its vibrant colors are evident in moist, sunny areas. There are little green buds on willows—pussy willows. Red-tailed hawks are generally solitary, but they perch side-by-side as mated pairs, reflecting bonding, hunting coordination or territorial behavior. The females are larger. Package delivery people wear shorts. March 15 is officially celebrated as Buzzard Day in Hinckley, Ohio, marking the annual return of turkey vultures (incorrectly called buzzards) to the Cleveland Metroparks' Hinckley Reservation. The annual return of the cliff swallows to Mission San Juan Capistrano (California) is celebrated on March 19, marking their arrival from South America. Some people believe spring begins when the Blue Jays return to Minneapolis. The Toronto Blue Jays are scheduled to play the Minnesota Twins at Target Field in Minneapolis on April 30.

Q&A

 Cheryl McRoberts of Haines, Alaska, spotted a flock of crows gathered around a dead crow and wondered if it was a crow funeral. It appears to be an organized respect for the dead, but it’s thought that crows don’t hold funerals to grieve in a human sense but gather in a large (not restricted to family members) chaotic, noisy and highly social "wake" to investigate the death of a fellow crow. It might be a fact-finding mission meant to identify the cause of death, potential predators or environmental dangers to avoid in the future. Death becomes data used to stay safe. Crows are social and extremely intelligent. Is it a recognition of loss? It looks like it. The crows know.

  Jennifer, Lily, Duncan and Derek of Pipestone asked how animals know when to change their coats. Maybe their mothers tell them as ours do. The primary trigger is a change in the photoperiod (length of daylight), which generates hormonal responses. As days shorten in the fall, hormones direct the body to grow thicker, often differently colored fur. Longer daylight hours in the spring cause the body to shed the winter coat. Temperatures and food availability play secondary roles in signaling. Warmer temperatures and delayed snowfall can cause mismatches, where animals (like weasels or hares) turn white and little snow falls. This causes the animals to be obvious, which makes them vulnerable to predators or unable to hunt effectively.

  Marlyss Johnson of Wells saw over 100 bald eagles gathered on a small lake named Penny Lake and wondered why they were holding a convention there. Bald eagles congregate on small lakes primarily due to an abundance of accessible food, such as winter-killed fish or fish concentrated in shallow areas. They might assemble there because of the open water for fishing or for socializing. The eagles could also be attracted to tall roosting trees near water, which are essential for resting and hunting.

Thanks for stopping by

  “Orbiting Earth in the spaceship, I saw how beautiful our planet is. People, let us preserve and increase this beauty, not destroy it!”—Yuri Gagarin, first human in space.

  “We are not an endangered species ourselves yet, but this is not for lack of trying.”—Douglas Adams.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

Robert Louis Stevenson wrote, “A birdie with a yellow bill Hopped upon my window sill, Cocked his shining eye and said: ‘Ain't you 'shamed, you sleepy-head!’"
These European starlings with yellow bills appeared to be somewhat less than enamored with the blizzard. Photo by Al Batt.

I wasn’t as warm as a common eider

Naturally

  March provides us with varied weather, most of which would be considered a brutal winter day in much of the world. It brings us hope and warm thoughts.

  A south wind brought birds—red-winged blackbirds and common grackles. New avian arrivals are lovely bringers of a new day. Canada geese honked while flying overhead. I’ve been told spring generally moves northward at an average speed of about 15 to 16 miles per day. Some say it’s 20 miles per day. Spring travels 100 feet uphill per day.

  I watched rock pigeons lift off from a grain storage unit. Often called barn pigeons, a flying pigeon’s heart beats can reach 600 per minute. The wind helped carry them away. The birds wore no puffy jackets.

  On a frigid day with a blistering wind. A shivering friend said he wished he had an eiderdown jacket. I’ve heard of eiderdown jackets often, but I’m not sure that I’ve ever seen one in person. I know they represent the pinnacle of luxury, warmth and rarity in insulating outerwear. They feature ethically harvested, ultra-light down from Icelandic or Canadian eider ducks. Top brands offering genuine, high-end eiderdown products include Vollebak, Härkila and Paul & Shark. None of those brands are available at the local Put It Back! Store. I asked my friend why he didn’t get himself an eiderdown jacket. He told me he’d checked the prices, and they were $4,000–$6,000. He added that they could last decades. They should.

  The down used is that of the common eider, a large migratory sea duck with a range along the northern coasts of eastern Siberia, Europe and North America.

  One species of eider is native to the Arctic coasts of Alaska and eastern Siberia. It’s the spectacled eider, a sea duck with bold white rings around its eyes that look like goggles. Before 1995, the winter location of this threatened species was a great ornithological mystery. That site was confirmed during aerial surveys in March 1995 and further documented in 1997. The entire world population of spectacled eiders was found huddled in small patches of open water surrounded by sea ice in the Bering Sea south of St. Lawrence Island. They dive to feed on clams and mollusks, equipped with a thick plumage meant to withstand harsh conditions.

  Back to the common eider, eiderdown is a type of down feather, a soft and fine layer of feathers found on the breast of the female eider duck. When the nesting season begins, she plucks the down feathers and uses them as nesting material to keep the eggs warm. People harvest the down when the young and adult birds abandon the nests in the summer. The ducks aren’t disturbed or harmed. The collected down is cleaned and used to produce filling for bedding and clothing. Approximately 85-90% of the world’s eiderdown comes from Iceland, and 10-15% comes from Canada. This down is exceptionally soft and has insulating properties superior to goose down, wool, cotton or synthetic fills. In the eiderdown business, profits are down.

  A 2026 Canadian study reported by New Scientist found that expert birdwatchers have greater brain tissue density in regions responsible for attention, perception and working memory compared to novices. Birding reshapes the brain in much the same way as learning a language or mastering a musical instrument does. Athletes exhibit similar adaptations in motor areas. These structural differences, likely driven by neuroplasticity, enhance bird identification skills and may help build cognitive reserve, potentially protecting against age-related decline.

Q&A

  “I watched dragonflies hunt one day last year. They never seemed to miss. How successful are they?” Harvard University researchers found dragonflies capture prey in 90 to 97% of their attempts.

  “How do I tell an immature bald eagle from a golden eagle?” Young bald eagles have a dark brown plumage mottled with white with large, heavy beaks and bare legs. They take 4 to 5 years to reach plumage with a white head and tail. Young golden eagles have more uniform, dark chocolate plumage, a golden nape, smaller beaks, legs feathered down to the feet, and a distinct, broad white band at the base of the tail and white patches under the wings, most visible in flight. An adult golden eagle is mostly dark brown with a golden wash on the back of the head and nape. An adult has a faintly banded tail. A young bald eagle’s beak is a dark brown/black and gradually transitions to yellow over 4-5 years. A golden eagle has a consistent tri-colored beak (dark tip, greyish-blue middle, yellow base) throughout its life.

Thanks for stopping by

  “I took a walk in the woods and came out taller than the trees.”—Henry David Thoreau.

  “Each species is a masterpiece, a creation assembled with extreme care and genius.”—Edward O. Wilson.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

The American tree sparrow (winter) and chipping sparrow (summer) are similar small birds with rusty caps. The tree sparrow has a central breast spot (sometimes hidden), bicolored yellow/black bill, dark legs, and rusty eyeline. A chipping sparrow has an unspotted breast, black bill, light-colored legs, and black eyeline. Edward Forbush nicknamed the chippy the "little brown-capped pensioner" because it foraged for crumbs around farmhouses. Photo of a chipping sparrow by Al Batt.

What is a kitty hawk?

Naturally

  Because an icy wind was turning my head around, I sought shelter in the south. I enjoyed a speaking gig on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, famous for being where the Wright Brothers achieved the first controlled, powered airplane flight on December 17, 1903. The moment the impossible became possible. The flights technically took place at Kill Devil Hills, a few miles away, but the Wright brothers used Kitty Hawk as their base of operations.

  What is a kitty hawk? The name is believed to have evolved from an Algonquian term, likely "Chickahauk" or "Chickahawk," which referred to "a place to hunt geese." Other theories suggest it developed from the early settlers' pronunciation of "skeeter hawk" (a local term for dragonflies) or the nickname of the wren, which was "kitty."

  Mallards kept me company in the Outer Banks. Mallards are found in every state at specific times of the year and are year-round residents of North Carolina. They are sometimes overlooked because they are so common. The male mallard is called a "greenhead" because of its green head. Adult male mallards have distinctive curled tail feathers called drake feathers. Drakes don’t have curled tail feathers until they molt into adult plumage. Scientists surmise that a curled tail is attractive to females. When the drakes go through an eclipse molt after the mating season, they lose their drake feathers, which grow back in time for the next breeding season.

  I’ve seen small flocks of red-winged blackbird males. This species prefers nesting in wetlands, marshes and damp fields, placing their nests in cattails, rushes, shrubs, sedges, saplings and phragmites. These locations protect their eggs and young from predators. They will readily nest in prairies, meadows, roadsides, hayfields and cornfields. Females construct cup-shaped nests using grasses, sedges, reeds, mosses and mud. The breeding season begins in early spring, with nests taking 3 to 6 days to build. The males return before the females to claim the best territories and defend them from rival males. Males typically return to their previous territories each year. The average territory is approximately .5 acres in size. Redwings often nest in loose colonies, with males aggressively defending territories that can contain multiple females. The males sing “look-at-me” to defend territory or to attract females. He spreads his wings enough to display red epaulettes and yellow feathers. The females claim a smaller territory within a polygamous male’s territory.

Q&A

 “I saw a tufted titmouse in my yard last year. What’s the plural of titmouse?” Both titmice and titmouses are acceptable as the plural of titmouse, though titmice is far more common. Titmice is preferred by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, National Geographic and the dictionaries I checked. The name originated from the Old English mase, meaning "small bird."

  “Something killed one of my chickens. What could it have been? Could an opossum be the culprit?” Chickens have a big problem. They taste just like chicken. Opossums are opportunistic omnivores that consume insects, slugs, earthworms, fruits and berries, pet food, chicken feed, baby birds (chicks), snakes, frogs, and things in compost piles. They eat eggs because everything does and eat a dead chicken as opossums are scavengers. Opossums are more of a threat to the eggs, chicks and sick birds easy to catch. Prime suspects include raccoons, weasels, foxes, coyotes, mink, hawks, owls, bobcats, dogs and cats. A chicken found in a pen with its head missing was likely the victim of a raccoon that reached in, grabbed the fowl, and pulled its head through the wire. If a chicken inside a pen or a coop had its head and crop missing, it’s probably the work of a raccoon. If the head and the back of the neck of the chicken are missing, a likely suspect would be a weasel or mink. If the head and neck are missing, the probable perpetrator is a great horned owl.

Thanks for stopping by

  “Birds should be saved for utilitarian reasons; and, moreover, they should be saved because of reasons unconnected with dollars and cents. A grove of giant redwoods or sequoias should be kept just as we keep a great and beautiful cathedral. The extermination of the passenger-pigeon meant that mankind was just so much poorer…And to lose the chance to see frigate-birds soaring in circles above the storm, or a file of pelicans winging their way homeward across the crimson afterglow of the sunset, or a myriad of terns flashing in the bright light of midday as they hover in a shifting maze above the beach-why, the loss is like the loss of a gallery of the masterpieces of the artists of old time.”—Theodore Roosevelt.

  “People from a planet without flowers would think we must be mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us.”—Iris Murdoch.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

Killdeer return in March. They are harbingers of spring. Killdeer is an onomatopoeia of the bird’s piercing call, a shrill “kill-deer.” It’s been called a noisy plover and a chattering plover. Its movements are typical of plovers—running a few steps, stopping, and tilting its head to look and listen for prey. A killdeer’s nest is a shallow depression lined with pebbles. The chicks resemble cotton balls atop two toothpicks. Photo by Al Batt.

I could never cache 80,000 sunflower seeds one at a time

Naturally

  I love seeing birds. On a day in our second winter when the wind was angry enough to blow the whiskers from my face and the blowing snow had a bite; I discovered once again that I’m happy to watch house sparrows. Not everyone enjoys their company, but the bird once known as an English sparrow is a beautiful, interesting creature that is doing what it needs to do to get by. The sparrows chirped away happily on a day when a human had to look hard to find a smile.

  I put peanuts in the shell in a feeder. The blue jays were busy casing another joint, but the radar of the white-breasted nuthatch worked, and the nuthatch enjoyed the peanuts. It got exercise as it hammered the legume shells to get to the nut meats. The nuthatch enjoyed a few before the peanut-early warning system of the blue jays kicked in.

  Trumpeter swans are checking out nesting sites and will claim the perfect spots for raising their cygnets. More beautiful birds. Trumpeters build their nests on top of muskrat or beaver lodges, or they pile sedges and cattail tubers into a mound on sites surrounded by water. The swans warm the eggs by covering them with their webbed feet.

  Chickadees are cute. Black-capped chickadees cache food items to ease their way through winter. Not only do chickadees remember their seed cache sites, they also remember which seeds had been eaten by them or by thieves. Researchers at Columbia University discovered that chickadees create neural barcodes, providing them with a system for managing their larders. During peak hoarding, a chickadee can store as many as 1,000 food items in a day. A study of a related species showed that as many as 80,000 seeds and insects were stored by one chickadee each fall. Work at the University of Toronto revealed that black-capped chickadees can accurately relocate caches for as long as 28 days. Chickadees spend most of their precious time near the caches where they had hoarded the most nutritious food. Chickadees remove cached items and hide them again in a new place, moving them repeatedly until they are eaten. It’s a meaningful game of hide-and-seek. The hippocampus is critical to the formation of these types of memories. Avian researchers found that the hippocampus in chickadee brains expands as the tiny birds gather and store seeds each fall. To support that incredible memory, chickadees grow 30% more neurons to add to their memory center in the fall when caching behavior peaks.

Q&A

  Casey McGill asked why Albert Lea Lake was noisy in February. It was caused by the ice expanding and contracting. The singing of a nice ice ballad is due to temperature fluctuations, which create booming, cracking, groaning or growling sounds that travel across the frozen surface. This phenomenon is common during rapid temperature changes when ice shifts, cracks or forms pressure ridges that act like a drum skin. Sounds are most pronounced when there’s little to no snow cover on the ice that might muffle the sounds.

  “I found a seashell in my grandmother’s house. I held it to my ear and heard the ocean. Why does that happen?” The seashell acts as a resonator, amplifying ambient environmental noise. The shell's hard, hollow and curved cavity captures surrounding sound waves, bouncing them around to create a low-frequency, echoing hum that resembles ocean waves. The shell acts as a filter, enhancing specific frequencies while dampening others. The sound is normal background noise—traffic, wind or distant conversations, which our brains interpret as the white noise of waves lapping a shore. You could get the same effect by cupping your hand over your ear, but it’s not as interesting when done by a snowbank or while shopping for peanut butter.

  “Are hummingbirds found anywhere else other than in the Americas?” No, hummingbirds are found only in the New World (the Americas), ranging from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego. They live in North, Central, and South America, and in the Caribbean. Fossil evidence shows they were once present in Europe during their early evolutionary history. Attempts to introduce them to Europe in the 19th century failed, as they aren’t native to those ecosystems.

Thanks for stopping by

  "Between every two pine trees there is a door leading to a new way of life."—John Muir.

  “Somewhere, always, the sun is rising, and somewhere, always, the birds are singing. As spring and summer oscillate between the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, so, too, does this singing planet pour forth song, like a giant player piano, in the north, then the south, and back again, as it has now for the 150 million years since the first birds appeared.”—From the book, “The Singing Life of Birds: The Art and Science of Listening to Birdsong” by Dr. Donald Kroodsma.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

Common ravens are the largest species of Passeriformes in the world, an order commonly known as perching birds or songbirds. Ravens have wedge-shaped tails, shaggy throat feathers and deep croaking calls. They have a heavier bill than crows, which are smaller with fan shaped-tails. The raven is an opportunistic omnivore immortalized by "Quoth the Raven, 'Nevermore,'" a famous refrain from Edgar Allan Poe's poem, "The Raven." Photo by Al Batt.

The earth has music for those who listen

Naturally

  The temperature hit the high 40s in February, and a chipmunk bopped out of its burrow to have lunch and do some grocery shopping. When cold weather hits, a chipmunk enters a state of torpor, which is a period of reduced activity and restless hibernation, in its burrow, where it can avoid the harsh elements and predators. It wakes regularly to eat from its cache of nuts and seeds.

  Shakespeare wrote, “The earth has music for those who listen.” I listened to the white-breasted nuthatch, nicknamed a "tree mouse" or an “upside-down bird” that moves headfirst down trees. It commonly produces a nasal "yank-yank" call that pairs exchange while foraging. But what I heard was a male nuthatch singing a rapid, nasal, fairly low-pitched wha, wha, wha that is sometimes described as “hey, hey, hey,” “why, why, why,” “what, what, what,” or “ha, ha, ha.” Males sing these songs in late winter and spring. I take it as a welcome sign of an approaching spring or the presence of a false spring. The bird was probably wondering what sort of critter I am and if I’m a big goofy bird, perhaps an odd duck, why I can’t fly. Then it laughed at me.

  A swishing shot in basketball can be called “string music.” A nuthatch can provide “spring music.”

From The Raptor Center (edited for brevity)

  Male great horned owls attract mates with hoots. If the female is interested, she gives a hoot. This leads to a courtship dance of bowing, cooing and beak touching. The male might share his food with the female, a big deal for a solo predator. A mouse might be the owl equivalent of flowers, chocolates and a steak dinner. At the end of January through February, the female lays eggs (generally 1-3) in an abandoned crow, hawk or squirrel nest. Why nest so early? It's theorized that since young great horned owls require a long period to learn survival skills (6-7 months), the parents need an early start. The chicks begin exploring the branches around the nest at around 6 weeks old and are fully flighted at 8 weeks. The Raptor Center anticipates its first owlet patients will arrive in early March.

Q&A

  Jennifer, Lily, Duncan and Derek of Pipestone asked if a chicken could survive in the wild. Chickens can survive in the wild, particularly if the wild is in a warm, tropical area. Think Hawaii. They do best in places that offer ample foraging and few predators. Chickens are adaptable, capable of flying to tree roosts, and can establish feral populations. They struggle in cold climates. Smaller, camouflaged or gamefowl breeds survive better than large commercial chickens. The bigger cluckers are walking billboards for hungry predators.

  “Do wild turkeys and domestic turkeys interbreed?” Yes, wild turkeys can and do hybridize with domestic turkeys because they are the same species. Hybrid offspring often have lower survival rates due to abnormal plumage or reduced physical abilities compared to pure wild birds. Authorities often prohibit the release of pen-raised turkeys because they can introduce diseases and threaten the genetic purity of wild flocks. If you see a white turkey in a gang of wild turkeys, does that mean it’s a hybrid? That could be the case, but it’s more likely because of genetic variation or a mutation. The color could make them a target for predators.

  “Does the early bird get the worm?” The saying “The early bird catches the worm” appeared in a collection of proverbs published in 1636, titled “Remaines Concerning Britaine” by William Camden. It suggests that being proactive and timely provides a competitive advantage. Modern behavioral ecology confirms that early-morning foraging confers measurable benefits. A 2021 analysis published in Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology reviewed 87 field studies across 32 passerine species. It was found that birds initiating foraging within 30 minutes of sunrise consumed, on average, 22% more caloric intake per hour than those starting after 7:30 a.m. During a drought, worms burrow deeper. This means the early birds might expend more energy searching with diminishing returns. In urban environments, artificial light extends nocturnal insect activity, making dusk feeding more productive. Socially dominant birds may stay lean and agile during the day, and eat later, before a cold night. If you’re a bird stuck in a low position in the pecking order, you’ll likely need to look whenever, wherever and however possible for food, be it a juicy worm or not.

Thanks for stopping by

  “There’s a whole world out there, right outside your window. You’d be a fool to miss it.”—Charlotte Eriksson.

  “You cannot get through a single day without having an impact on the world around you. What you do makes a difference and you have to decide what kind of a difference you want to make.”—Jane Goodall.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

I saw this horned lark in February. The horned lark is the only lark native to North America. It prefers open spaces—the bare ground with sparse vegetation found in empty places like tundra, heavily grazed pastures, prairies, shores, airports and fields. The horned lark’s song is a high-pitched tinkling. Collective nouns for a group of larks include an ascension, chattering, exaltation and happiness. Photo by Al Batt.

The only venomous mammal in North America

Naturally

  The weather was tolerable. Some might have called it barely tolerable, but the onslaught of winter had paused. That meant bad weather was on the way.

  What do we do when severe weather looms? We go to the store and stock up on the necessities like Twinkies and Bugles. Birds do something similar. They find food and eat a lot of it. Because most birds can’t go to the grocery store (I see an occasional house sparrow in one), I top off the bird feeders, while waving my pom-poms. I’ve found the simple act of filling a feeder gives me a sense of place.

  As I did that cheering chore, I nearly stepped on a tiny shrew. It had been eating sunflower seeds spilled on the ground. The northern short-tailed shrew is the largest shrew species in Minnesota, at 4 to 5 inches long including the tail, and weighing up to 3/4 ounce. It has smaller eyes than a mouse, no visible ear flaps, and an elongated, pointed snout. Mice, voles, rats, squirrels, chipmunks, woodchucks and beavers are rodents. Shrews and moles are not rodents. They belong to the order Eulipotyphla, a group of small mammals that specialize in eating insects. Shrews will eat grubs, worms, snails, slugs, spiders, other small animals and plant materials like sunflower seeds. The heart of a short-tailed shrew beats between 800 and 1000 times per minute. Bats aren't the only mammals to use echolocation. Shrews use it to help them navigate in dark environments. The short-tailed (northern and southern) shrew is the only venomous mammal in North America. This shrew’s saliva contains a neurotoxin that kills or paralyzes its prey. One well-placed bite helps to subdue or kill larger prey such as mice and voles. It holds medical potential with a component being studied as a possible treatment for ovarian cancer.  Shrews have an exceptionally high metabolism rate, and these opportunistic omnivores have a voracious appetite that serves their need to consume the equivalent of their body weight each day.

 “The Taming of the Shrew” is a comedy written by William Shakespeare. The word "shrew" comes from the Old English, "shrewe" and means the animal or an "ill-tempered, scolding person."

Q&A

  “I saw a mouse in a tree. Is that normal?” In Minnesota, the mice in trees are typically deer mice or white-footed mice, both of which are adept climbers that use trees for nesting in cavities, abandoned bird nests, or for foraging. They use their long tails for balance. They are highly active in wooded areas and can be found in trees year-round, including during winter. These arboreal mice do not hibernate and can be seen around and in homes.

  “How do turkeys survive winter?” Wild turkeys spend their hibernal time looking for food and roosting in trees. Winter is hard on turkeys. It’s hard on us. Turkeys are tough and made to survive severe weather. They reduce movement to conserve energy and heat. Conifers make reliable roosting trees because they shelter the birds from the wind. Trees on southern-facing slopes offer more sunlight. Turkeys switch to a diet of acorns, waste grains, seeds and fruit (apples, cherries, etc.) and scratch for food where the wind has swept the snow away. The males sometimes practice strutting because a male can never look too cool.

  “Are rabbits and bats rodents?” No, neither rabbits nor bats are rodents. Rodents are in the order Rodentia, while rabbits are in Lagomorpha and bats are in Chiroptera. Chiroptera means "hand-wing." Bats are more closely related to primates (like humans) and cats than to rodents. They are the only mammals capable of true flight.

  “Where might I see a seahawk other than in Seattle?” There is no such thing as an avian seahawk. No ornithologist would refer to a raptor as a seahawk, but some people might consider “sea hawk” to be a nickname for ospreys or skuas. A skua isn’t a hawk. Skuas are predatory, gull-like seabirds known for their aggressiveness and kleptoparasitism (pirating food from other birds). The term "jaeger" is used in North America for the three smaller species, while "skua" refers to the larger species. The bird that leads the football team onto the field is an augur hawk, native to Africa. It’s not a sea hawk.

Thanks for stopping by

  “I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead, tomorrow hasn't arrived yet. I have just one day, today, and I'm going to be happy in it.”―Groucho Marx.

  "People need wild places. Whether or not we think we do, we do. We need to be able to taste grace and know once again that we desire it. We need to experience a landscape that is timeless, whose agenda moves at the pace of speciation and glaciers. To be surrounded by the singing, mating, howling commotion of other species, all of which love their lives as much as we do ours, and none of which could possibly care less about our economic status or our running day calendar. Wildness puts us in our place."—Barbara Kingsolver.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

They were barking. Sundogs or parhelia, are bright, colorful patches of light that appear roughly 22 degrees to one or both sides of the sun. They are created when sunlight bends (refracts) through ice crystals acting as a prism. They display color dispersion similar to rainbows, with red closest to the sun and blue on the outside. Photo by Al Batt.

Where flowers bloom, so does hope

Naturally

  It was a bodacious day. There was no need for me to hide, as there was little or no wind to find me. Strong winds had left dirty snowmen in their paths, if any snowmen were still standing, in rural locations. That’s what happens when you wear white when the soil takes to the air.

  The day grew sunnier. Merle Hall was kind enough to send me a book titled, “How to Tell the Birds from the Flowers and Other Woodcuts” by Robert Williams Wood. The book’s verses and illustrations provide lighthearted flornithology, which is described as a blend of flora and ornithology. Here are a couple of examples of the writings from that book: “Who is there who has never heard, About the Burdock and the Bird? And yet how very very few, Discriminate between the two, While even Mr. Burbank can’t, Transform a Bird into a Plant.” And “Upon this cake of ice is perched, The paddle-footed puffin: To find his double I have searched. But have discovered—Nuffin.”

  The birds in my yard headed for their hideouts. That was for good reason. I saw a hunting Cooper’s hawk. It was a female, significantly larger than the male. According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, small birds are safer around Cooper’s hawks than are medium-sized birds. Starlings, mourning doves, rock pigeons, robins, jays, flickers, quail, pheasants, grouse and chickens should be on a constant vigil when a Coop’s is near. Cooper’s hawks also prey on mice, voles, chipmunks, squirrels, small rabbits and bats. Even though this hawk displays incredible agility, a study showed that 23% of the Cooper’s hawks examined had healed fractures in the bones of their chest. Their wishbones had taken a battering. They had likely flown into windows and other things while in pursuit of a meal.

Book report

  I saw a Christmas hawk, a rough-legged hawk, which I see regularly on Christmas Bird Counts. Falconers infrequently use rough-legged hawks. I haven’t taken up falconry, but I did get around to reading “H is for Hawk” by Helen Macdonald. I’d been fixin’ to do that for years. In T. H. White's “The Sword in the Stone,” the wizard Merlin transforms Arthur into a small falcon known as the merlin. White was a frustrated falconer with a goshawk. Goshawks are mysterious creatures in both White’s and Macdonald's books. The name goshawk comes from the Old English words for "goose" and "hawk." Attila the Hun chose the fierce goshawk as the emblem on his helmet. When Macdonald’s father died, she was devastated. Driven by grief, she found the goshawk's temperament mirrored her own. The book is an account of bereavement, natural history, biography and a memoir of a life with a goshawk named Mabel. In the end, it’s a triumph over adversity.

Q&A

  “Do fish have eyelids?” Eyelids help moisten eyes, so they don’t dry out. Eyelids protect eyes from things in the air, like dirt and dust. Most fish don’t have eyelids because they live in water, which keeps their eyes moist and protected with no need to blink. Fish don’t close their eyes to sleep; instead entering a resting state while staying alert. Some species, including sharks and certain mackerel, have an "adipose eyelid," which is a transparent, fixed covering, or, in some sharks, a nictitating membrane.

  “A neighbor uses coyote urine to keep deer away. Its effectiveness is questionable, but where do you get coyote urine?” From coyotes. Sorry about that. Coyote urine is purported to discourage deer from loitering where they aren’t wanted (not everyone falls for the irresistible charm of deer), and fox urine is supposed to keep rabbits out of a garden. Research is mixed regarding the results. If you’re asking where to buy it, big box stores and online. I’m sure your favorite local garden center could get it for you. If you’re asking where those who supply the retail channel get the urine, the recycled urine is collected at facilities housing the animals by use of specialized floor drain systems that collect the liquid into storage containers. If you use coyote urine to deter deer and it attracts too many coyotes, you’ll need to buy wolf urine to keep Wile E. away.

  “Do red-tailed hawks migrate?” Many red-tailed hawks in Minnesota do migrate south for the winter, beginning their journey in the fall. Many of these hawks move to southern states, with juveniles often migrating farther south than the adults. Others endure our lovely winters and are found in open fields near cities or farmland. The red-tailed hawk is a winter resident in the southern half of the Gopher State.

Thanks for stopping by

  “If you can’t be in awe of Mother Nature, there’s something wrong with you.”–Alex Trebek.

  “Where flowers bloom, so does hope.”–Lady Bird Johnson.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

What do you do if you left home without your puffy jacket, even though your mother told you to never leave home without your puffy jacket? What do you do? If you are a bird, like this house sparrow, you fluff your feathers to trap air close to your body. This acts as insulation. And you poke your beak under shoulder feathers to keep it warm on a beak-chilling day. Photo by Al Batt.

The Goldilocks bird

Naturally

  Feeling peckish, a Goldilocks bird stopped by to sample the fare at a feeder. A Goldilocks bird is a chickadee because it’s just right.

  I am happy to see birds. They comfort me. We are all canaries in a coal mine. I put out a handful of peanuts in the shell. The blue jays flew in the minute the last peanut dropped on the feeder. They formed a staggered line based on a pecking order. The CEO went first. The jays in the bottom half of that hierarchy experienced lengthy waiting times. They waited impatiently as if they were stuck behind a shopper attempting to use a fistful of expired coupons, while other jays searched for the heaviest peanuts for a better meal.

  The sun had caused my shadow to be hurled far ahead of me when I saw a red fox tiptoeing through the yard. A fox’s musky scent marks its territory. Its potent urine serves the same purpose. The scent is similar to a skunk’s spray, but not as powerful or far-reaching. Red foxes belong to the canid or dog family, but they share behaviors with cats like hunting alone, stalking and pouncing on prey, and walking on their toes (digitigrade locomotion). An identifying field mark is the white-tipped tail. Red foxes can hear the low-frequency sounds of rodents digging under the ground or snow. Increases in Lyme disease frequently coincide with a decline in the red fox population. Foxes help control Lyme disease by preying on white-footed mice, the preferred host species of the ticks that become infected with the bacteria carrying the disease. Fox populations decrease when coyote numbers expand.

Q&A

  “How do birds survive extremely cold weather?” Our winter birds are better at dealing with severe weather than we are. You’ve likely noticed many birds are wearing Patagonia coats. That keeps them toasty warm, and they look good in puffy jackets. Through adaptations and behaviors aimed at maximizing heat production and minimizing energy loss, birds survive the cold. Birds become borbs (bird + orb) by fluffing up, which traps air between the layers of feathers, creating a thermal barrier, and by tucking their bills under their wings, or standing on one leg, pulling the other leg into their feathers to limit exposed surface area. Birds shiver to increase their metabolic rate and generate internal heat. A bird’s specialized circulatory system allows warm arterial blood heading to the feet to transfer heat to the cold venous blood returning to the body, thus keeping the feet from freezing. Some small birds roost together in tight clusters at night to share body heat. Birds use tree cavities, dense evergreen foliage or roosting boxes as shields from wind and precipitation. Birds prioritize fat-rich foods like suet and oil-rich seeds like black oil sunflower seeds to boost their metabolic heat. Chickadees, nuthatches and blue jays cache food for the times when natural food is scarce.

  Jennifer, Lily, Duncan and Derek of Pipestone asked how bald eagles got their name and if birds have ears. The eagle's name comes from an Old English word "balde," meaning white, and describing the adult’s white head. Birds may not wear eyeglasses or earrings, but they have ears. Their ears are hidden behind small holes covered by protective feathers (auriculars) on the sides of their heads, rather than external ear flaps like humans. External ear flaps would create drag, hindering flight efficiency. Owls have asymmetrical ears for precise sound localization to aid in capturing prey.

  Mark Malepsy of Albert Lea put up a snazzy squirrel-proof bird feeder. It has stymied the squirrels, but the birds don’t like it. He wondered what he could do. The birds are being influenced to boycott the feeder by the powerful squirrel lobby. Your patience gives the birds time to make a discovery. It can take weeks for birds to trust a new feeder and food source. They are wary of new things. Make sure the seed is good. You could change location, sprinkle some seed on the ground below the new feeder, or move an existing feeder nearby to draw attention. Place the feeder where you can enjoy watching it. Good luck.

Thanks for stopping by

  “The environment, after all, is where we all meet, where we all have a mutual interest. It is one thing that all of us share. It is not only a mirror of ourselves, but a focusing lens on what we can become.”–Lady Bird Johnson.

  “We must not only protect the countryside and save it from destruction, we must restore what has been destroyed and salvage the beauty and charm of our cities … Once our natural splendor is destroyed, it can never be recaptured. And once man can no longer walk with beauty or wonder at nature, his spirit will wither and his sustenance be wasted.”–Lyndon B. Johnson.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

Llonamae Svebakken of Preston shared the story of the winter of 1967 when a bump in the night came from the basement of their old farmhouse. Her husband investigated and discovered a hungry muskrat. They fed Mushy the muskrat all winter. Mushy confined his bathroom duties to an unemployed tub. He left via a drainpipe when spring neared. Llonamae’s story proves that not all things that go bump in the night are unpleasant. Photo by Al Batt.

What bird sang “A Spoonful of Sugar” with Mary Poppins?

Naturally

  Yipes! It’s winter when the weather is not nothing, but it shouldn’t need to be a contest either. Winter will win.

  When I was a boy, someone gave me a ceramic bird whistle. A gift to the senses. I added water to it and then blew into the bird whistle’s mouthpiece, which produced crisp and sweet bird sounds of the warbling variety. The generic bird had a large crest and was of a solid brown color. I couldn’t identify the species by sight or sound, but it was delightful to hear, especially in January.

  This reporter of avian wonders is happy to see every bird, but some more than others. A nuthatch makes me smile. A white-breasted nuthatch picked up a sunflower seed from a platform feeder and then put it down. It picked up another and put it back. It was like a grocery shopper searching for the perfect peach. Or a bowler trying to find the perfect ball to roll a 300 game. The bird picked up a third one, secured the seed’s position in its bill, and flew away. Food to go. Is it all about the thrill of the chase to a nuthatch? Are they picky, picky, picky? Is seed art a favorite hobby of nuthatches? No, it’s evaluating each sunflower seed, looking for one that had proper heft to it. It chooses one of superior quality that would make for fine eating. The white-breasted nuthatch is sometimes called the “upside-down bird” from the way it finds food.

  I paid a visit to someone living in an ancient home. Aged abodes are often welcoming to critters. There was a carpenter ant walking on the floor of the house. I told the homeowner not to worry about it. Carpenter ants are busy just like human carpenters. There was no telling when it would be back.

  I’ve been keeping company with a dense January fog, which is a typical Minnesota weather pattern, often linked to warm, moist air meeting cold surfaces, causing the low-visibility and mild, damp conditions. It’s the weather that grandmothers could feel in their bones. Advection fog forms when that warm, moist air moves over a cold surface, cooling the air to its dew point and condensing moisture into fog, which adds to the varied weather of our genial winters.

Q&A

  “Do great horned owls bring in nesting materials?” Great horned owls don't build their own nests. They take over existing stick nests from animals like hawks (a red-tailed hawk nest is commonly used), crows, ravens, herons, eagles and squirrels, or use tree cavities, ledges, witches’ brooms or deserted buildings and deer stands, and occasionally on the ground. I saw one owl nest amid a great blue heron rookery. Great horned owls might add lining, such as shredded bark, leaves, feathers and fur from prey, or their own downy feathers plucked from their breasts to make it more comfortable and homier. Sometimes they add nothing. The nests deteriorate quickly, making it impossible for the owls to obtain insurance, and they are forced to abandon the nests.

  “I saw a robin in January. Is that a rare sighting?” If you have never seen a robin before in January, it would be rare. In “Mary Poppins,” the beloved robin Mary (Julie Andrews) sang with in "A Spoonful of Sugar" was an American robin, not the European robin, which would be common in a London setting. American robins are members of the thrush family, while European robins are smaller and members of the Old World flycatcher family. The American robin was named after the European robin due to a superficial similarity—an orange breast. I know, the birds are called robin redbreasts, but they are orange—maybe a rusty-orange. The robin became the iconic bird of Christmas in the Victorian era, when postmen were nicknamed robins because of their red waistcoats. Robins appeared on Christmas cards to represent the postmen who delivered them. The European robin is the unofficial national bird of the United Kingdom. How often is the American robin seen in London? I know one was spotted in London in 2006, and others have been seen in the U.K., but rarely. So, if you live in Minnesota or Iowa and not in London, it’s not rare to see an American robin in winter. The charming robins that remain here change their diets in winter from worms and insects to fruit and berries. Robins gather in crabapple, red cedar, highbush cranberry, hawthorn and hackberry trees to chow down. The rockin’ robins can winter here because of that diet change, they are tough, they form flocks (since they lack social media), and they maintain a positive attitude.

Thanks for stopping by

  “Nature is one of the most underutilized treasures in life. It has the power to unburden hearts and reconnect to that inner place of peace.”–Janice Anderson.

  “Being able to smell the fresh air and disconnect from the news and your phone—there’s nothing like it.”—Jason Ward.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

These are the tracks of an eastern cottontail rabbit. When a rabbit hops, its hind feet land in front of its smaller front feet, creating a Y shape (Y for bunnY)—the large hind prints at the top of the Y and the smaller, staggered front prints below. Squirrel tracks are side-by-side in a W shape. If the trail stops at a tree, it’s a squirrel. If it goes into the brush, it’s a rabbit. Photo by Al Batt.

Is Bugs Bunny really a rabbit?

Naturally

  Winter can be a bit of a killjoy and cruel if we’re not careful.

  On the roadsides, gusts of wind scattered small birds like leaves.

  There were wild moments at my home’s windows. Feeders attached to the glass bring my local wild kingdom even closer.

  I stopped at a friend’s house. We sat and watched the activity at his busy feeders. The cardinals were everywhere. I told someone later that I’d seen a ton of cardinals. That was a slight exaggeration. It would have meant I’d seen 21,333 redbirds, which would have been cool, but I’d have been unable to count them all. I hope you see something big out your window. Something really big—like a tiny chickadee.

  An opossum was grinning like a possum eating a potpie under a feeder in my yard. It was cleaning up sunflower seed spillage. Rose Kennedy said, “Life isn't a matter of milestones, but of moments.” I wonder if Rose Kennedy wrote that after seeing an awesome possum?

  While credited as Possums in the movie “Bambi,” they are Virginia opossums. A possum is a different animal from Australia. The film depicts them hanging upside down by their tails. Only baby opossums can do this, and only for a brief time.

  Here’s a tip from the trail for you. If you ever find yourself lost in the woods, find an opossum and follow it. You’ll be in the middle of a road in no time.

  A warm spell causes male skunks to look for love in all the wrong places—or at least one wrong place. Roads make easy waddling except for the getting hit by vehicles part. In the movie “Bambi,” the title character, a new fawn learning to talk, called a skunk "Flower" after meeting him in a flower patch. The name stuck. Flower was both adorable and odorable.

Book report

  I enjoyed reading “Raising Hare” by Chloe Dalton, whose thoughtful storytelling and an eye for detail described a life with a leveret (a hare in its first year), which grew into a doe and a mother. Several lines made me pause and consider. Dalton wrote, “For the first time in my life, I have had cause to study animals rather than people, and to see that we are not diminished by making way for them. Coexistence gives our own existence greater poignancy, and perhaps even grandeur.”

  I found it a wonderful read about the author’s relationship with a wild thing.

Q&A

  Jennifer, Lily, Duncan and Derek of Pipestone wondered why doves and pigeons build flimsy nests. I had to assume the position of “The Thinker” statue to ponder this question. I leaned over, my right elbow placed on my left thigh, holding the weight of my chin on the back of my right hand. I did that fully clothed, which somewhat restricted my deep contemplation. Dove nests appear poorly constructed to us because of a minimalist form that prioritizes speed and efficiency over structural integrity. Their nesting strategy aims for quick reproduction rather than building a long-lasting nest. Doves can slap a nest together in a day or two, which reduces the time they are vulnerable to predators while gathering materials, and makes it possible to start the reproductive cycle quickly. And they can get by with it because there are no building permits required.

  “Do rabbits have vocal cords?” The primary sound-producing organ in rabbits is the larynx (voice box), which is in the throat. Within the larynx, rabbits have vocal cords, flexible bands of tissue that vibrate when air passes through them. These vibrations create sound waves. In addition to vocalizations, rabbits can produce sounds by thumping their hind legs on the ground. See the movie “Bambi” for the foot-thumping rabbit who declared, “That’s why they call me Thumper.”

  Bugs Bunny talked up a storm, but I’m not sure Bugs was a rabbit. I grew up in the company of jackrabbits and Bugs looked like a jackrabbit to me. Hares generally have longer ears and hind legs than rabbits. So, that means Bugs Bunny, despite his name, is a hare. Right? Hold on there, you hardworking brains. Bugs Hare would have one major character flaw—he lives in a burrow. Hares live above ground, and use camouflage and speed to survive. Rabbits could spend time underground in burrows or warrens. Warner Brothers produced Bugs Bunny cartoon titles that included the word “hare” in them. So, hare or rabbit? It’s more likely a character and a name best suited to creative and comedic needs. Shakespeare had his moments, but I’ll rely on an expert nimrod named Elmer Fudd to settle this. Elmer called Bugs a "wascally wabbit," not a “wascally jackwabbit” or “wascally hare.” There’s the answer. Elmer Fudd has spoken.

Thanks for stopping by

  “To walk in nature is to witness a thousand miracles.”—Mary Davis.

  “Joy in looking and comprehending is nature’s most beautiful gift.”—Albert Einstein.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2026

We’ve all likely made a quacking sound to imitate a duck. The classic duck’s quack is the sound of a mallard hen. It’s a myth that a duck’s quack doesn’t echo. Mallard, Iowa, which is south of Curlew and north of Plover, used to have a high school with a memorable school cheer: "Black and Gold, Gold and Black, Mallard Ducks go quack, quack, quack." Photo by Al Batt.

BIRDING WITH BATT  If you missed “Birding With Batt” on the airwaves this week, you can hear it any time you like via the free KMSU radio streaming app. The app is available for Apple and Android devices, allowing you to livestream 89.7 the Maverick, find playlists and listen to shows on-demand.

https://mankato.mnsu.edu/kmsu-radio/podcasts/

Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie

Naturally

  I don’t make New Year’s resolutions, but if I did, it would be to continue to be excited about every bird I see from my window. How much is that birdie in the window? It’s priceless.

  Lots of birds showed up at the feeders, bringing squirrels with them. If I made New Year’s resolutions, I’d resolve to enjoy the company of squirrels.

  While doing a Christmas Bird Count, I happened upon a mixed flock of birds busily foraging. There were black-capped chickadees, white-breasted nuthatches and downy woodpeckers in the group. The chickadees were leading the tiny, feathered wagon train. More eyes detect more predators and find more food. These three species feed in unique ways, so they don’t get in one another’s way.

  I saw a turkey chasing a crow. The turkey extended its neck and charged like a bull after a matador. The crow appeared to rejoice in the activity. It nimbly avoided the attacks while gleefully taunting its attacker. I don’t know what was going on, but I suspect bourbon drinking might have been involved—specifically Wild Turkey and Old Crow brands.

  Snow had kissed the earth, making subnivean life possible. That’s life below the snow. Above the snow, mice, with their long tails, leave tail drag marks between the tracks of their feet, while voles and shrews don’t.

  I watched a rough-legged hawk hunt by hovering or kiting in place, facing into the wind to spot prey like voles and mice in an open field. This raptor’s remarkable aerial ability allows it to scan a vast area, a unique adaptation for its treeless Arctic breeding grounds and wintering fields. It’s as if the raptor were using an invisible treadmill. An American kestrel also forages in open areas with short vegetation. It’s primarily a sit-and-wait, elevated perch-hunter. Its hovering flight is a less frequently used hunting method, often used where perches are lacking.

Q&A

  “What is the bright glow on the snow called?” Albedo is a measurement of how much a surface reflects solar energy. Snow and ice have a high albedo. Ice reflects 50-70% of sunlight, and snow bounces back as much as 90% of solar radiation. Moonlight produces a lower albedo, and winter nights with a snowpack on the ground can be bright, especially under a full moon.

  “Are cats native to this country?” Domestic cats aren’t native to North America. European colonists introduced them to control rodent populations on ships and in settlements, and cats became a widespread invasive species. This continent is home to several native wild cat species like the bobcat, lynx, puma (cougar, mountain lion, catamount, panther, painter), jaguar, ocelot, jaguarundi and the rare margay. Wild cats have been popular names for automobiles: Jaguar, Buick Wildcat, Mercury Cougar, Ford Puma, Mercury Bobcat, Sunbeam Tiger and Chevrolet Tiger.

  “Is a flock of cowbirds called a herd?” If not, it should be, right? A herd is a collective noun for cowbirds, as is a flock, corral and mob.

  “Are wild turkeys found in every state?” Wild turkeys are found in every U.S. state except Alaska. Contrary to popular myth, Benjamin Franklin never proposed the wild turkey as our national symbol, but he praised the species in a letter to his daughter, calling it “a much more respectable bird” than the bald eagle. Ben considered the bald eagle a bird of bad character because of its habit of stealing the prey of other birds. The wild turkey is named after the nation of Turkey. Here’s what the good folks at Merriam-Webster have to say about that: “When the new-world turkey was introduced to Europe by the Spanish in the 16th century, English speakers gave credit to the Turks: the Ottoman Empire was at its peak, and the English were in the habit of calling all sorts of things "Turkish." Maize was called "Turkish wheat," pumpkins were referred to as "Turkish cucumbers," and Meleagris gallopavo was a "turkey-cock," and, eventually, a plain old turkey.”

  “What were the four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie?” In the nursery rhyme “Sing a Song of Sixpence” there is this line, “Sing a song of sixpence a pocket full of rye, four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie.” In the Tudor period, cooks tried to impress with their exciting presentations of food because they couldn’t run a TV commercial during halftime of the Super Bowl. They needed to please the king and his official royal food taster, who tested food for the monarch. You dared not plop a bowl on the table and declare it the slop of the day. That could lead to a beheading or worse. They baked an empty pie crust and put live blackbirds inside the crust. “When the pie was opened the birds began to sing, oh wasn't that a dainty dish to set before the king?” The pie was placed in front of the king, and the blackbirds flew out in a spectacular display. Afterward, a real pie was brought out. The 24 blackbirds in the nursery rhyme were likely Eurasian blackbirds, a common thrush species related to the American robin.

Thanks for stopping by

  “Blessed are they who see beautiful things in humble places where other people see nothing.”—Camille Pissarro.

  "Snowflakes are one of nature's most fragile things, but just look what they can do when they stick together."—Vesta M. Kelly.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2025 

Friends gave me this fetching cap for Christmas. It’s making me more chirpful. Seeing a cardinal symbolizes spiritual messengers, lost loved ones visiting, hope, love, vitality, joy and renewal. Cardinals appear when angels are near. The redbird is a bright spot in winter. Put out sugar cookies to attract someone wearing this cap.

Doing a Christmas Multicolored Asian Lady Beetle Count (CMALBC)

Naturally

  I did a Christmas Bird Count (CBC) and a Christmas Multicolored Asian Lady Beetle Count (CMALBC) on the same day. The latter Count was done in our house. The number of beetles indoors was impressive, as was the density of the fog outdoors.

  Fog eats snow. While fog doesn't literally eat snow (I’ve never heard any sounds of a fog’s munching) or make it vanish before my eyes like David Copperfield might, but the fog does make the snow melt faster. The above-freezing air temperature contributes to snowmelt, but when fog forms, condensation occurs. The process of condensation releases energy as heat, which is released into the air. This added heat increases the rate at which the snow melts. The water droplets from the fog itself will melt snow.

  I slipped and slid as I walked through the mud, snow, rain, wind, mist, ice, slush, water and fog. No treadmill could offer all that. Several deciduous trees were stubbornly hanging onto their leaves as they watched my silly stumbles—the red oak, ironwood and buckthorn.

  I filled the feeders before I ventured off to ring the bells for the Salvation Army. When I returned home, there were footprints galore underneath those feeders. The squirrels and the rabbits had been busy. When a squirrel hops and lands, its larger back feet land parallel, just in front of its smaller front feet, which land side by side. The resulting shape is square-ish. Rabbits land with one forefoot in front of the other. This paints a picture of two fore-footprints behind the two larger hind-footprints resembling the letter Y. SQuirrels leave SQuare tracks, while Ys are the mark of a bunnY. Because squirrels live in trees, one of the best ways to identify their tracks is to follow them. It doesn’t take long before squirrel trails lead directly to and end at the base of a tree. Rabbits must go around the trees. Rabbits frequently leave droppings that look like Cocoa Puffs along their trails. My apologies to those who enjoy a fine bowl of Cocoa Puffs. I rarely find any squirrel scat, which is smaller than rabbit poop. That’s because squirrels prefer using porta-potties. I base that statement on a staggering lack of evidence.

Q&A

  “Do birds eat snow to stay hydrated?” They do, but it uses energy to convert snow and ice to water. I watched a chickadee during a Christmas Bird Count getting water from a dripping icicle.

  “What do opossums and raccoons do during the winter?” The Christmas opossum showed up in my yard this year as it does each year. A marsupial miracle. The weather was warm enough that a couple of raccoons were out for a walk to find food. Raccoons don’t hibernate during the winter. They enter a state of lowered activity called torpor, which doesn’t last as long as hibernation. Raccoons wake up to forage during this time. A warm day encourages that activity. Raccoons seek shelter in hollow trees or logs, rock crevices, woodchuck burrows, brush piles, chimneys, under buildings and in abandoned buildings. Opossums don’t have raccoon coats, so winter is a struggle. I watched one using its tail and its mouth to carry dry leaves and grass to insulate its bed. They don’t hibernate but also enter a state of torpor. Torpor may be our 51st state as many men enter into it while watching football games on TV. Opossums den up in rock piles, woodpiles, squirrel nests, tree hollows, brush piles, abandoned burrows and buildings.

  “How long does a loon need to run on the water before becoming airborne and what is a loonie?” Loons need 30 yards to a quarter mile (depending on the wind) to flap their wings and run across the water to gain enough speed for liftoff. Finnish folklore says that when the creator (Nature) made the first loon, the creator accidentally forgot to give it legs. As the legless bird flew away, Nature realized the oversight and threw a pair of legs and feet at it. The legs struck the back of the flying bird’s body and they stuck there. The legs became attached far back on the bird's torso, facilitating its exceptional diving and swimming abilities while leaving it awkward on dry ground. A loonie is a colloquial term for the Canadian $1 coin or Canadian dollar, introduced in 1987. The name comes from the coin’s reverse design featuring a loon.

  “Do pine siskins look like goldfinches?” Pine siskins and American goldfinches are related. The siskins can appear to be goldfinches wearing streaked pajamas. The goldfinches are slightly larger and lack streaking on their breasts.

Thanks for stopping by

  "Blessed is the season which engages the whole world in a conspiracy of love."—Hamilton Wright Mabie.

  “Blessed are those who can give without remembering and take without forgetting."—Elizabeth Bibesco.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2025

American goldfinches are now in winter (also known as nonbreeding or definitive basic) plumage. Nicknamed the “wild canary,” the male’s spiffy breeding attire fades from his vibrant colors to the duller look of the less conspicuous females. Both sexes are drab olive, with the male showing hints of yellow on the throat and shoulders. Photo of American goldfinch by Al Batt.

It’s the birder way

Naturally

  I could do nothing about the weather, so I warmed myself by ringing the bells for the Salvation Army. I love it when that happens. 

  Leonard Cohen sang, “Ring the bells that still can ring. Forget your perfect offering. There is a crack, a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in.”

  Christmas is good company. So are the birds of Christmas. On my walk from the car to my destination to ring the bells, I saw starlings foraging along the edge of the parking lot. Their bills were bright yellow in breeding season, with the base of the lower mandible blue in males and pink in females. I’m not making that up. However, research suggests that the blue/pink indicators are not definitive. More’s the pity. A starling’s bill darkens after the breeding season to a dark gray-brown or black, with few maintaining the yellow face swords. But that’s not for long as the bills of adult males begin to turn yellow in late December or January, followed by adult females, then first-year birds. The yellow appears first near the base of the lower mandible and progresses to the tip. The starlings I crossed paths with brought a thawing noise to a gelid winter’s day.

  Leonard Cohen again, “The birds they sang at the break of day ‘Start again,’ I heard them say. Don't dwell on what has passed away or what is yet to be.”

  I see multicolored Asian lady beetles in my house each day. Apparently, I’d signed a rental agreement. Scientists estimate that insects make up 80 to 90% of all animal species. The largest known order of insects is Coleoptera (beetles), with 300,000 to 400,000 species of beetle described to date. The multicolored Asian lady beetles, as their name hints, are beetles. I’m glad they haven’t invited all their relatives to come home fro the holidays.

  I feed the birds all year, but I find a special joy in putting out peanuts in the shell for the blue jays and nuthatches around Christmas. It gives me a warm Christmas feeling on the coldest of days. Blue jays are amazing peanut detectors. Chickadees enjoy peanuts, too. Not even the nicest, smiling coffee shop provides the comfort of seeing a single chickadee at my feeder. A chickadee brings sunshine with it.

  I wore a Detroit Lakes Festival of Birds sweatshirt as I went about my daily obligations and smiled at everyone I encountered. The garment was a way for me to let my birder flag fly. The sweatshirt advertised the Festival of May 1997 and carried a cracking good image of a golden-winged warbler. Yes, I’ve been wearing that sweatshirt since 1997. Not every day. Clothing needs a break to catch its breath. In my defense, 1997 was a great year for sweatshirts. Hats and shirts bearing a likeness of a bird or a pithy saying about birding don’t wear out. If they do become tattered and torn, I keep wearing them. It’s the birder way.

  How many Christmas Bird Counts does a man have to do before you call him a birder? The answer is blowing in the wind—horned larks, snow buntings and Lapland longspurs—birds that feed and hang out where the wind has blown the ground bare. As long as they keep showing up for Christmas Bird Counts, so will I. I love it when that happens.

Q&A

  “Do birds other than starlings create murmurations?” A murmuration is a mesmerizing flock of starlings that move together in a shapeshifting, coordinated cloud through the sky. A breathtaking sight for human eyes that provides the birds with safety in numbers. It makes it difficult for predators to zero in on a particular bird. A starling changes its position in a flock because it’s unwise to be at the flock’s edge for long, as that makes the bird more vulnerable to raptors. While murmuration is commonly associated with starlings, other bird species exhibit similar flocking behavior. However, the term “murmuration” is generally used specifically to describe groups of starlings. Their stunning aerial displays are elegant things for a mere, but fortunate human to see.

  “How small a hole can a bat get through?” Bats can enter through holes as small in diameter as the size of a dime. That sounds unbelievable, but the bat likely holds its breath. Typical entry points to a house include through chimneys, vents and openings near pipes, wires, doors, windows or damaged exterior siding. Hardware cloth can be used to cover chimneys and vents. Caulk, weatherstripping, insulation materials, screening, steel wool or duct tape could be used to close these and other entry points. Leave the entry sites open until mid-August to allow young bats the time to leave and not be trapped.

Thanks for stopping by

  "Christmas is doing a little something extra for someone."—Charles Schulz.

  "Christmas is most truly Christmas when we celebrate it by giving the light of love to those who need it most."—Ruth Carter Stapleton.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2025

In my boyhood, they were called English sparrows. House sparrows are native to Eurasia and northern Africa, not to the United States. They were introduced in 1851-53 by Nicholas Pike, Director of the Brooklyn Institute, to rescue trees from caterpillars. More were released for pest control by other people in various parts of the country over the next 25 years. Photo of a male house sparrow by Al Batt.

The always-a-house cat is on blizzard watch.

House sparrows catching a nap during a blizzard.

What do you get a birdbrain for Christmas?

Naturally

  At first light, I read the texts of the night—tracks left in the snow. They weren’t all signed.

  A crow was up early. When perched in a tree, a hawk exhibits an upright, vertical posture, while a crow has a more horizontal stance. A hawk sits with its body and tail pointing straight down. A crow sits with its tail pointing out at an angle, in a more horizontal body alignment.

  The American Ornithological Society has made changes that affect checklists and field guides. One change is that the warbling vireo has been split into the eastern and western warbling-vireos.

Q&A

  “Do you have suggestions for Christmas gifts for birdbrains?" What do you give a nature lover for Christmas other than your undying appreciation or raucous cheers extolling their perfection? Birds come already wrapped. Share your love of them with another. Warm socks, gloves or mittens, a cap (the sillier a hat looks, the warmer it will be) or flip-top mittens that allow the wearer to fold back the top of the mitten to reveal fingerless gloves. I love the arm freedom vests provide. Books and more books of all kinds. I enjoy the tactile sensation of paper field guides, but digital field guides are excellent, too. I prefer painted birds over photos and guides covering more than a single state, but your preferences may vary. A small book showing the birds of only one state is suitable for those who do their birding from the kitchen window or at a feeder. I advise you to look at field guides in a bookstore before deciding which one fits. A Leatherman, ice cleats, trekking or hiking poles, snowshoes, a dependable travel mug (one that hollers at you when you are about to forget it somewhere—please let me know if you find one), a pocket-sized notebook, or a back, day or fanny pack. Binoculars are lovely gifts but are easier to buy for a child than for an adult. Get a gift receipt or be accompanied by the adult gift recipient at the time of purchase. A membership in a local bird club or nature center, Cornell Lab of Ornithology, American Birding Association, Minnesota Ornithologists’ Union, Wild Ones or Izaak Walton League. Please don’t fall for the scam and join the Poison Ivy Lovers of Minnesota group. I’ve been the only one there at the last three meetings. A state park sticker, a hand lens, feeders, birdseed, a subscription to BWD magazine (a birding publication), or a trail camera.

  “How can I tell if the footprints are those of a dog, coyote or fox?” A coyote print is triangular and, unlike a domestic dog’s print, a coyote’s toenails are often faint or absent on the two outside toes. The nails on the inside toes are longer than a dog’s and sometimes point towards each other. Dog prints are rounder, broader and splayed or messy, and are less symmetrical. Foxes have furred footpads to reduce heat loss and improve traction. This can obscure its footprints. The tracks of coyotes and foxes are in a straight line because a wild canine wishes to conserve energy, especially in winter, and moves with purpose. Dogs walk more haphazardly, tending to wander to investigate and sniff every stump, bush, large rock or change in the landscape. Coyote and fox tracks show the hind foot landing precisely on the front footprint, dropping where the front foot had been until it was lifted. This is called direct registering. Some domestic dogs might do this, but they don’t maintain it for long before becoming distracted.

  Chuck from North Carolina asked what my spirit animal would be. A chickadee—any species of chickadee. In Native American symbolism, seeing a chickadee is thought of as good luck. A Cherokee myth associates them with knowledge and the truth. Chickadees can adapt to different environments and weather. They are lively and energetic, and serve as a reminder to me to focus on the small moments of happiness and to find joy in the present. They are effective communicators, observant with a keen awareness of their surroundings. They observe and absorb.

  “Is the suet from a meat market or the commercial cakes of suet the best for birds?” Birds enjoy raw suet, the kind sold at a butcher’s shop, but raw suet spoils quickly. Use it only in cold weather. If used in hot weather, it will turn rancid. Commercially made suet cakes, which don’t spoil in warm weather, often have cornmeal, cherries, oranges and cranberries mixed into them. The birds don’t care about the added ingredients. I might.

Thanks for stopping by

  "Christmas will always be as long as we stand heart to heart and hand in hand."—Dr. Seuss.

  "Christmas is like candy; it slowly melts in your mouth sweetening every taste bud, making you wish it could last forever."—Richelle E. Goodrich.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2025

The Tennessee warbler is a small, thin-billed, greenish-yellow bird, that is common but plain-looking. “Plain-looking” isn’t the way the bird describes itself. The Tennessee warbler is misnamed as it breeds primarily in Canada, not Tennessee. It got the Tennessee name because Alexander Wilson encountered one there. It feeds on caterpillars in the summer, thriving when spruce budworms are abundant, and becomes a nectar thief in the winter. Photo by Al Batt.

How hard does a woodpecker hammer a tree?

Naturally

  It was cold, and it was colder. The birds were staying busy being birds. A good friend named Harvey Benson from Harmony reported his bird feeders were being swamped after a generous dumping of snow. He claimed to know only three kinds of birds: blue jays, cardinals and all the rest that he lumped under the name “birds.” Harvey is proof that you don’t have to identify birds to enjoy them. He loves to watch and feed his avian amigos. Birds cast a magic spell and change the way we see everything.

  It was -12 degrees and I was wearing the perfect number of layers of clothing as I chugged along past some evergreen trees ribboned with snow in the yard. The needles can help if the trees refuse to identify themselves. The pine needles grow in bundles of two or more, whereas spruce needles are attached to a branch individually. I clicked the heels of my ruby slippers, but it was still -12 degrees. I continued to chug along.

  That temperature isn’t conducive to spotting hummingbirds, but I’m grateful they keep me company when the temperature is more civilized. In eastern North America, the ruby-throated hummingbird is not only the star of the hummingbird show, it’s the only one with a part. The rubythroats are the only species of hummingbird known to breed east of the Mississippi River. Thinking of them warms me. I have peered at hummingbirds in Costa Rica, which is home to 53 or 54 species of hummingbirds. I’m glad my yard has at least one species.

Q&A

  “How important are pollinators to our crops?” Very important. Grains like corn, wheat and rice are wind-pollinated and don’t rely on insect pollination. Most soybean varieties self-pollinate by design, but pollinating insects can improve pollination. Wheat and oats are primarily self-pollinated. Approximately 35% of the world's food crops rely on pollinators. Somewhere between 75% and 95% of all flowering plants need pollinators.

  “How many different kinds of tree squirrels are there in Minnesota and is the black squirrel a separate species?” There are five kinds of squirrels: eastern gray, American red (pine squirrel, chickaree, boomer), fox, northern flying and southern flying. The black squirrels I see are gray squirrels even if they’re not gray. A few years back, the scientific journal BMC Evolutionary Biology had an article by British biologists about their discovery that the gene variant causing black fur (melanism) in eastern gray squirrels is identical to the gene variant causing melanism in fox squirrels. The authors believed that interbreeding between fox and gray squirrels allowed melanism to transfer to the gray squirrel population. An evolutionary geneticist reported that black-coated animals had an 18% lower heat loss and a 20% lower metabolic rate, which means a black-colored squirrel has a better chance of survival than a gray-colored squirrel during our winters. Black fur may offer a thermal advantage, but gray squirrels vary from all gray to reddish to bicolored to all black. A gray squirrel can have white ear tufts during the winter. A white squirrel that isn’t an albino is a variant of the gray squirrel. The fox squirrel is typically brown-grey to brown-yellow, with a brownish-orange underside.

  “How many times does a woodpecker hit a tree with its bill?” Research published in the Journal of Experimental Biology found that woodpeckers can strike hundreds of times per minute at forces 20 to 30 times their body weights. Downy woodpeckers can strike and exhale as many as 13 times per second, with an inhalation between each blow. The data showed that the hip flexor and front neck muscles play a major role in propelling the beak forward and generating the force of impact. Supporting muscles at the base of the skull and along the neck brace the bird’s head, while the abdominal muscles stabilize the torso. Specialized tail muscles flex before impact and act as an anchor, stabilizing the bird’s hip and providing a solid fulcrum against the tree trunk.

  “Where did the name ‘squirrel’ come from?” The ubiquitous squirrel, busily rushing about our yards, gardens, parks and cities, and swiping seeds from our bird feeders because they think they are squirrel feeders, has had its English name since the 14th century. The word squirrel is Greek in origin, coming from skiouros, from skia, meaning "shadow," and from oura, meaning "tail." The ancient Greek squirrel sat as our modern-day Minnesota squirrel does with its bushy tail raised against its back and over its head, casting shade as an umbrella might.

Thanks for stopping by

  “Nature tops the list of potent tranquilizers and stress reducers. The mere sound of moving water has been shown to lower blood pressure.”—Patch Adams.

  “It isn't the mountains ahead to climb that wear you out, it's the pebble in your shoe.”—Muhammad Ali.

  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2025

Gulls are worm charmers that perform a “rain dance” or a “worm dance,” wherein they stomp on the ground to hunt worms. Their foot taps mimic the vibrations of moles hunting worms underground, and/or the sounds and vibrations of raindrops, which entice earthworms into coming to the surface where the gulls can take them out for lunch. Photo of ring-billed gull by Al Batt.