Before we jump into Spring, I want to take two steps backward.

Bird Count

On December 29, 2024, we participated in the 36th Mount Horeb Area Christmas Bird Count. Kerry Behler coordinated the event, as usual, and compiled reports from 19 different search parties. Over the years, countless participants have seen an average of 54 species in late December. Weather conditions vary from year to year: from cold with lots of snow to foggy and drab, like in 2024.

Kathie described the day like this: “The heavy fog/very low clouds made everything into a silent and mystical fairyland.” The birds were quiet and hard to see through the mist.

Kerry said our one red-necked pheasant was a good find, and the 17 sandhill cranes seen New Year’s Day were also exceptional (see below for our complete list). Other highlights of the overall count: 37 bluebirds, 56 robins, 927 starlings, 731 juncos, 575 geese, 543 crows, 468 tree sparrows and 427 chickadees.

Several species were unique or found in low numbers, such as the great blue heron, belted kingfisher, northern shrike, brown creeper, winter wren, cedar waxwing and song sparrow. Nine golden-crowned kinglets were found by five different parties!

Participants found 8 different raptor species: bald eagle (9), red-tailed hawk (67), rough-legged hawk (4), kestrel (21), red-shouldered hawk (1), northern harrier (5), sharp-tailed hawks (3) and Cooper’s hawk (6).

Owls were also about in the misty twilight: great horned (4), barred (5), short-eared (2). Woodpeckers were “well represented:” red-headed (18), red-bellied (99), downy (116), hairy (62), pileated (19), flicker (8).

I give you the numbers of individuals to encourage bird walks even when it’s cold outside. You will not be disappointed. Nurture wild places, even in your own yards and neighborhoods, and the birds will come.

Our group, and counts at Pleasant Valley: Kathie Brock, Jill Feldkamp, Pam Joseph (and Ron Lutz on January 1).
Geese (25), mallard (30), pheasant (1), eagle (3), sandhill crane (17), kingfisher (1), red-headed woodpecker (1), red-bellied woodpecker (1), hairy woodpecker (2), pileated woodpecker (1), blue jay (2), crow (5), white-breasted nuthatch (2), robin (4), tree sparrow (7), junco (5) = 16 species total.

So, how do birds keep warm in winter? They fluff up their down, they shiver, they cuddle. They tuck their feet and they shelter in brush, evergreens and snow hollows. They eat feverishly when they sense cold fronts and storms coming, and they have a physiology that circulates their blood much faster than other animals. Sometimes I liken them to miniature “heat pumps:” They pull heat out of the air in winter to stay warm, and they reverse the process in summer to stay cool.

Making Seed Mixes

On January 21st, we made the seed mixes using seeds we collected last year. We will plant the seed after our Spring burns. Our 2024 seed harvest was modest (48 pounds total), as it has been in the years since we last planted a large prairie in the East Basin. Our seed is not super pure since we don’t sell it. Typically, we overseed in areas where we worked on aggressive species such as Canada goldenrod, pale Indian plantain, sumac and cattails.

We separate the species into categories defined by their light/ moisture preferences: dry prairie, dry mesic, open savanna, wet mesic, wet, and woods. This year the pound totals turned out to be approximately 3:18:8:9:2:1, respectively. That ratio has differed every year. Seeds from Black Earth prairie are handled in a similar way.

In my haiku below I want to exhort everyone to help restore the balance of nature, to save and make places for other-than-human creatures to flourish:

spread seeds everywhere—
plant diversity, or risk
singular demise 

And finally, to catch you up, on February 25 Kathie and I checked out the five kestrel boxes in our care to see if the wood shavings were free of sticks, leaves and mice. Kathie has an old camera mounted on a long pole and uses the timer feature and flash to photograph the insides of the boxes (see above). It’s a two-woman job to lower one of these nest boxes to the ground for housekeeping. We had to remove sticks from one and a mouse nest from another. Whoever invented the hinged pole these boxes are mounted on deserves an ice cream cone.

Up next: Spring burns!