Spring Sprang - the Dog Days are Here

Spring is now long past and the exuberant singing and displaying of my avian gender mates has vanished like the cool evenings. The most dramatic change is the absence of the black-throated gray’s hoarse melody greeting me before dawn. Gone too are the impetuous flutings of black-headed grosbeak. Even Bewick’s wren has fallen silent here in the midst of the hundred degree dog days.

Now I give thanks for the more common vocalizations, last night a handful of western screech owls conversed from the tall oaks and pines just at dusk. The past few mornings wrentits have chattered and sang from the shaded manzanita – perhaps driven uphill from the scorching slopes below us. Western wood peewees repeat their simple refrain and western tanagers call from the conifers. Even the incessant r-i-i-i-i-ng of the spotted towhees has diminished. The only constant is the ubiquitous shrieking of Hutton’s vireo.