Not quite spring, but…

April may be the cruellest month for the poet, but for me, it’s a time for newness and hope. It’s Easter month, but winter’s not totally gone yet for us, despite the official arrival of spring according to the calendar.

Many of you might be enjoying colorful roses blooming in your garden, this is what I see when I head out to the woods today––the last day of March––snow-covered creek and dried cattails from autumn past:

But the Pond is teeming with life, a cacophony of bird calls from everywhere. Here’s our first robin coming back from afar, the sure sign of spring:

Plenty of buds for the hungry chickadee:

And from afar, a coyote, which doesn’t look too enthused about the changing season. I’ve to warn a mother pushing a baby carriage nearby:

On the river, it’s a different picture:

It’s courting season already. The male Goldeneyes doing their mating dance… stretching their necks upright and singing their tune. The females (brown heads) don’t seem too interested though:

Oops just a bit too close. It’s been a few months of house-bound inactivity, don’t mind me getting excited for a better pic:

***

Published by

Arti

If she’s not birding by the Pond, Arti’s likely watching a movie, reading, or writing a review. Creator of Ripple Effects, bylines in Asian American Press, Vague Visages, Curator Magazine.

14 thoughts on “Not quite spring, but…”

    1. These are just some pics of my own backyard. Surely Banff and Lake Louise are beautiful places, but at this time, Lake Louise is still frozen solid, and trails in Banff are snow or ice covered, many still closed I believe. I’ll give it another couple of months to thaw before I’d venture out there. 🙂

      Like

  1. The robin always was the preeminent sign of spring in our midwest; I’m glad to see you finally have one! Every time I read ‘golden eye,’ I always think of the famous fish: smoked golden from Manitoba.

    This past week, I heard “the sound” of spring: baby mallards following their mother around and peeping like crazy!

    Like

    1. The Common Goldeneyes are quite a site to watch during courting season. The males would do these antics to attract the females which usually just swim by nonchalantly. Real fun.

      Liked by 2 people

  2. What lovely pictures! I love seeing the Spring changes, and youve got such a great place to view them.
    The kids were excited to hear bird song this week…and then it snowed again. But I hear them singing this morning so maybe spring is here to stay???
    If I don’t get back online, have a very blessed and Happy Easter, Arti!

    Like

      1. Oo thats a long time away, we’ve had daffodils and crocus out for a while now and those blue flowers I can’t remember what they’re called now. It’s very wet over here, Easter can be hit and miss sometimes really hot and sunny, sometimes cold and rainy.

        Like

        1. I think the flowering season in your area probably is more like Vancouver, BC, our neighbouring province to the west. They have beautiful cherry blossoms too probably by now or in late April. We in Alberta are used to late spring and late blooms. 😉

          Liked by 1 person

  3. We don’t have your snow but we don’t have roses here, either — and it will be a few months before we do. But you have those fabulous blue skies, open water and glorious wildlife. What’s not to love?

    Like

  4. We just had a blizzard Friday night/Saturday and attained third snowiest winter on record. One of the few things keeping me from going crazy are the birds. I hear the morning chorus everyday on my way to work and have giggled several times at the wild turkey courtships happening around town because the females are completely uninterested in the puffed up males and their feathers. Soon we will both see green leaves again!

    Like

    1. We’ve had a relatively tame winter, albeit the temp. right now is below average a little. And the birds sure don’t mind. We don’t have wild turkeys running around here. You’ve piqued my interest to see what their courtship routine is like! 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s