Coping with Winter

Coping with Winter

We’ve had a few cloudy days here, some rain, a bit of snow these past few weeks. Things look bare and winter-worn and we are only a third of the way into the season. The trees reveal their hidden nests, small ones for birds, larger ones for squirrels. The natural world seems to be in waiting mode.

What about all the excitement of the new year? Has it disappeared already?

Not for Mother Nature, it hasn’t. Nature is alive and active: there is life to protect during the cold months. The leaves may be gone but the trees have merely slowed down, conserving their energy in a process called dormancy, waiting for Spring. Squirrels are busy fattening up for the coming cold weather still to come. Birds fluff up their feathers to keep themselves warm as they munch on the seed in the feeders or wherever they can find it and seek shelter in coniferous tree branches. Deer huddle in groups, slow their metabolism, and watch out for each other. Chipmunks semi-hibernate, lowering their body temperature, though they don’t actually sleep.  They are coping with winter in their own special ways.

And what about us? How are we coping with winter?

Just because it’s cold doesn’t mean we have to hibernate. It’s a good time to reconnect with friends who are busy all summer. Libraries offer programs like book discussions, art exhibits, author visits. Forget resolutions – follow your intentions to do what feels right to you. Every year, every season has its excitement. It’s called life.

How trees survive winter:

http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/wilderness-resources/stories/how-do-trees-survive-winter

Birds keep warm in winter:

http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/wilderness-resources/stories/how-do-trees-survive-winter

Hidden and Revealed

Hidden and Revealed

I was driving down a neighboring street the other day and saw a couple of trees that made me stop the car and pull over to contemplate them. There were no leaves on their branches (rightfully so in this season) and it was too early for them to flower but there was a sense of life about them from nests that spoke of birds and eggs and life cycles that usually are hidden from ordinary sight. Such private things, now revealed. It felt like I was peeking at something sacred.

I didn’t know which birds had built them, if it was one species or a mixture; we have many different birds calling our area home. We have squirrels that make nests in our backyard maple and white pine trees, though these nests didn’t seem large enough for them. Will the birds come back to the same nests in Spring or will these start to fall apart, offering their twigs for new nests and new life?

So much of life is hidden; flowers within buds, plants concealed in seeds, babies inside bodies. Eventually the impetus of nature reveals them and the world gets to see the beauty that was harbored there. An idea is hidden until someone speaks it or acts upon it and allows others to see it. This duality has an energy that speaks of movement, of progression, of growth. In it, like with the change of seasons, is a sense of anticipation that animates life.

When we come upon something that we hadn’t seen before or understood or perhaps even considered, it opens us to a broader dimension of existence. It helps us to stop in our everyday tracks and pay attention. And it may even bring a feeling of gratitude for having been there at the right moment to discover something more of ourselves.

Which birds reuse their nests? Join the conversation:

http://www.thriftyfun.com/tf97112338.tip.html

For Eloise

For Eloise I usually blog about what is going on around me – in my backyard, my neighborhood, places I visit and things I hear about. Today I have to blog closer to home. I may have mentioned my cockatiel Eloise. On April1, she turned twenty-two; on April 10 she passed into birdie heaven.

That is a long life for a cockatiel; most live 12-15 years though I did hear of a bird that lived to be twenty-six. We were aware that she was beginning to show signs of age. She hadn’t been flying as much lately and when she did, she often got lost and had to be rescued. Her food choices changed. She used to love vegetables (she preferred red-leaf lettuce to romaine) and fruits (she would dance back and forth on her perch when watermelon was being served) but she began to ignore anything wet or soft, favoring crunchy things. And she stopped wanting to do her usual things such as roosting on the railing of my chair in the kitchen to share my lunchtime crackers or keeping my husband company on his shoulder (she liked him best) while he read the morning newspaper. I always knew when my husband was about to come home because Eloise would chirp loudly and, sure enough, shortly thereafter he would pull into the driveway. I became aware recently that she stopped chirping at his approach.

We knew she was winding down but she was still pretty perky and interacted with us. Shortly after her birthday Eloise started to seriously decline. She was always free to leave her cage though she began to spend more time inside and when she left tried to fly, she went down to the floor and could not fly back up. My husband or I would gently lift her and she would scramble back on the bars. Eloise had always been a family-conscious bird. Even though I fed her first, she would wait until we were both seated at the table before she would dig into her own dish; suddenly she was eating before us or ignoring her food altogether. Then she started wanting to spend more time with me, a distinct shift from her fixation on my husband. She would let me gently pet her, a previous no-no, and lay her head against neck when I stood beside her cage. Her chirps changed, too. They became weaker and of a different quality, almost like a plea for me to come over and be with her, which I usually did.

On Saturday, Eloise made a sound that made me put aside what I was doing and rush over to her. She instantly stepped off the top of her cage and onto my shoulder. Then she snuggled against my neck and stayed there. It seemed to comfort her. If I moved, she moved – to get even closer. I spent much of the afternoon and all of the evening with her pressed tightly against me. At bedtime, we gently put her in her cage and said goodnight, wondering if she would be there to greet us the next day.

Eloise was down on the bottom of her cage in the morning. She had died in the wee hours by herself. I was feeling sad about her death but also about not being there when she died. But then I remembered that people often wait until they are alone before they depart. We buried her lovingly, already missing her. She had been a long-term companion. I hoped that we gave her as much as she gave us, that she felt loved and cherished during her life.

I am sure that many of ,you have loved animals or birds. Please feel free to share your stories.

The Survival of the Cleverest

Crash! Bam! I heard a lot of banging against the windows in my kitchen, dining room, and smack into the glass panel of my back door. It startled me the first time this happened but by now it is somewhat common and I know what it means: a hawk is on the prowl. The birds take off from the feeders and bushes, from their comfortable perches on the roof, and head into what looks like clear space in their panicked flight to escape. I am always surprised that they don’t give themselves concussions, they hit that hard, though I haven’t yet seen any bird lying zonked out on the ground.

As usual, I ran to the window to check out the drama. Creatures were scattering everywhere in mad disarray. What surprised me though, was what the squirrels were doing. One of them looked up at the sky, then dashed onto the bare limbs of the butterfly bush under a canopy of concealing snow. Another wiggled its way between the seed pails we keep on the patio and blended into the shadows. The most intriguing of all, however, was the squirrel who found an alternative use for the baffles we put up to keep exactly those critters off the bird feeders. This one shimmied up the pole and into the tube. Normally, if they are just investigating the possibility of getting up to the feeders that way, they soon see the futility of it and come right down. This time the squirrel stayed silent and hidden with all of its parts tucked tightly inside.

Sure enough, I saw the hawk whip through the backyard, its wings spread wide but nothing in its talons. It took off beyond the tulip tree to parts unknown. The squirrel in the baffle slowly peeked under the tube and looked around. No hawk. It slid down and started eating the seeds that had fallen from the feeders. And then everyone returned to resume what they had been doing before the alarm went off.

I thought of Darwin and the survival of the fittest theory. The scene I had just witnessed made me re-think what the fittest means. Is it the most physically fit, the strongest? Is it the most adaptable gene pool? Perhaps it refers to a superior mental agility. Maybe it’s all of the above. Certainly, in this case, survival was due to some very clever actions. It makes me wonder how over the years scientists could discount the thought process in animals. That seems to be changing. I hope so. This was an impressive display of individual problem solving and what clearly seems an example of the survival of the cleverest.
I am sure I’m not the only one to witness the actions of some very clever animals. If you have, too, share what you’ve seen with us.