Brings all the birdwatchers to the yard

[sholio]

It FINALLY feels like spring today, after several days of spitting snow and 20F highs with windchill down to 0F. Still, the shorebird and waterfowl migration is in full swing, and since I was in town today, I stopped by Creamer's Field (local migratory bird refuge and stopover on the North American migration corridor) to check out the trumpeter swans.

I do truly love Fairbanks: I pulled in and the parking lot at the viewing area (at 2 p.m. on a Tuesday) was full. And it's a large parking lot! Everyone was all out there being hushed and delighted and photographing the swans and the swarms of geese and ducks. I love how into this kind of thing everyone here is.





Click to embiggen.

We really do have an absolutely disgusting amount of snow for late April. The cleared parts of the field are only because it's been plowed back. Meanwhile, the birds are remarkably unconcerned about cars and people. One of the things I love about this place is that the viewing area is right there by the parking lot; you're actually only a few feet away from the birds when they're out like this. The wooden fence you can see in the foreground of the top pic is the one the public stands behind. (The management scatters bird-friendly grain to keep them up front, but it's really a win-win since they get a nice lunch to refresh them after their migration, and the public gets a good bird viewing experience.)

--

In other news, Tsalmoth (Vlad #16) is out today! I completely forgot about this until hamsterwoman was talking about it. I have not even started to read it! No spoilers, plz.

If you're interested, there's quite a nice discussion of Vlad and Morrolan in Dragon and Taltos going on in hamsterwoman's comments, no spoilers for the new book that I recall.

Comments

[silverflight8]

OMG trumpeter swans. I saw them for the first time this past Dec and almost teared up.

And that sure is some late season snow. All brown and clotted up with old grass and dirt, haha.

[sholio]

They're so huuuuuge. I've seen them from a distance quite a bit, but I was at the bird refuge a few years ago when we had a lot of them, and one came in flying right over my head and it was like holy waterfowl, Batman, that's a lot of bird! (That was when I looked it up and discovered they're the heaviest bird in North America and one of the heaviest in the world. I had no idea!)

Too bad the snow doesn't make a more scenic backdrop! 😅 It is definitely not the prettiest time of year for sure.