The crazy wind from last evening had died down by this morning, and the sun was out for a bit, but the cold was back, so the park was almost as empty of people as yesterday. The red-tailed hawk, however, did not put on a repeat performance. Instead, the cold seemed to slow down the little birds so that I had a better chance of keeping up.
The first such little bird is this young white-crowned sparrow by the pond. I suspect it is the one I’ve been seeing on and off, but this is my first sighting this month.
I wasn’t sure I had a good picture, so I tried to follow it when it moved, but I ended up taking a bunch of pictures of this female house sparrow instead. Ha!
A little higher in the trees, I found this trio of woodpeckers. First a male red-bellied, …
then a female hairy, …
and finally, a male downy.
Back at the river, I was happy to see our solo song sparrow still kicking around.
Finally, I counted four goldeneyes today, three hens and one drake, along with a few common mergansers and a bunch of mallards, and this goldeneye hen made the nicest picture.
Signs of Life in Estabrook Park 