Back to “early” spring weather…

Flickr was having problems this afternoon, so if the pictures don’t come through, wait a while and try again later. That’s what I had to do just to get them into this post.

After the crazy warm-up yesterday afternoon, some normality has returned to the weather this morning, but before it did, I got to see our first turtle of the year, this painted turtle sunning itself at the pond. Woo hoo!

This morning was back to cloudy, cool, and windy, however, so here’s a fox sparrow staying out of the wind beside the river. We’ve had one by the pond for much of the winter, but I believe this and a few of its comrades are all new arrivals.

Farther upstream, near the two islands, the belted kingfisher that I’d been hearing and glimpsing for a few weeks finally sat still long enough for a picture. Maybe this time he’ll stick around.

Finally, I’d like to send a special thanks to Gene, who cleaned up and refurbished the wood duck nesting boxes I had collected from the island, back when the pond ice was thick. They had fallen to the ground and weren’t going to do the wood ducks any good. He brought his canoe and a bunch of tools to the pond yesterday afternoon, and we reinstalled the boxes back on the island. Phew! That was a job. Here’s hoping we get some wood duck ducklings on the pond this summer!