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Well, the sun finally came out, and the wind was nice and calm, so 7°F seemed like a small price to pay for such a glorious morning. Some of the critters might probably prefer the opposite trade-off, but let’s hope that anyone not built to handle this weather has long since flown south. Anyway, you’llContinue reading “The sun makes an appearance at last…”

The snow did finally arrive, even though the sun stayed hidden until I got back home, so there was a nice change of scenery after all, and I’ll take it! Our new gadwall drake was still on the lower river, and he appeared to be having icing issues that the mallards were not facing, butContinue reading “A change of scenery at last!”

Happy New Year! I hope yours is off to as nice a start as mine is. This morning looked like many recent mornings with low, dark skies, but as Forrest Gump always used to say, “Estabrook Park is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get.” This morning, I was thrilledContinue reading “A new bird for a new year!”

I don’t have a lot of time this morning, and it looks gray as heck out there again anyway, so let’s do a little year in review instead. Here are some of my favorite pictures from 2021. Nothing brightens up a gray day in January like a male northern cardinal on sumac, eh? But aContinue reading “2021 wasn’t all bad…”

The exciting news is that we have new arrivals in the park again, this time a foursome of female common mergansers, the likes of which we haven’t seen since March. Here are the two that swam closest together. Meanwhile, the mallards continue going about their business and achieved some nice duck density in this image.Continue reading “Just waiting for the snow to arrive…”

Brrr. It was colder than it looked this morning, and I should have checked the “real feel” temperature before heading out. My hands are still pretty stiff from the cold as I try to type this. Anyway, it seemed as though the big animals saw my post yesterday and took offense or took pity onContinue reading “The pendulum swings the other way…”

Despite a few nice little breaks, the gray skies are hanging around like a Gloomy Gus this month. Even the buffleheads, the smallest diving ducks in North America, and whom I usually find hard at work, were sleeping in this morning. This gray squirrel isn’t even the smallest squirrel in the park, let alone NorthContinue reading “A morning of miniatures…”

Despite the weather, or perhaps because of it, it was quite a nice morning in Estabrook. I didn’t get there especially early, but I still got to make the first human footprints in a lot of the fresh sloppy snow lying on many parts of the river trail. Things were pretty quiet on my wayContinue reading “Plenty to see on a gray Monday…”

As dawn broke this morning, the sky looked like it was going to be clear, so I hustled out the door soon after I noticed, and it didn’t take long for that to pay off. I had just crossed Wilson Drive, stepped into the park, and hadn’t even crossed the Oak Leaf Trail yet whenContinue reading “Happy Foxing Day!”

Look who I spotted hustling home this morning with the beaver equivalent of a vegan holiday feast. Fresh willow bark, and just in time, baby, just in time! Meanwhile, our favorite blue heron was back to fishing again and even farther south than yesterday. Finally, one of the little red squirrels was wondering what theContinue reading “More last-minute deliveries…”