First Killdeer

Was heard last night, just after dark, when I was dragging bedding over from this side of the creek to bed up for the night. I used to keep the round bales Matt gave me over by the barn, but now we have four cows going outside and they tear the bales all up...so I have to lug it a lot farther.

It was sweet to hear the cry of the killdeer while I was doing the lugging though. Seems as if it is early for them. I will have to check back and see.

It is amazing to me how migration, which had barely begun just three or four days ago, is in full swing now. I went with Alan to get a load of hay yesterday and the roadsides were black with assorted black birds....funny how the red winged black birds and grackles flock up with the local starlings to form massive mobs that set the air ringing with their calls. They were settling over the long-harvested corn fields and then swirling up in black clouds only to settle again a few yards away.

We also saw a neat thing, a pileated woodpecker clinging precariously to a spike of stag horn sumac, tearing it up with its big chisel beak. It looked at first like a plastic toy, stuck in the branches and I did a double take as we whizzed by on our way home with sustenance for the girls....speaking of which, I cannot wait for green grass, which is our only possible savior this year. You don't have to buy it and they can eat as much of it as they want to. Praying for an early spring here with great sincerity.