Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations What's wrong with these animals???

So, last year, about this time, a buddy and I both noted robins flying around my place. Figured most of 'em froze to death afore spring really got here.

YESTERDAY, I'm sitting in the gun room at 3 PM (just got back from Texas) having a smoke and chattin' to an old buddy on the phone.

Just about dropped my smoke when I realized that the hawk I was wantin to put the fear of gawd into finally flew close enough for me to realize it was a GBH (Great Blue Heron)! Feb 14, it's 23F, 2 feet of snow on the ground and a heron flies by. Good luck to him finding an open hole to fish in. Just wish I'd had the camera handy...

Matt, Strange days, indeed!

Yesterday we were coming home from a road trip and saw a giant Wild Turkey walking northerly on the mighty Rock River. It was 8 degrees with a south wind. I can only assume that he figures spring is coming, though slowly at walking speed.

This time last year a ritzy neighborhood near my work advised people to slow down on one of their roads to avoid killing robins that were traveling across to reach crabapple trees in the median.

A couple of weeks ago a GBH landed by my pond too. It was frozen solid. You'd think it could have seen that from the air.

Matt, we frequently see large groups of Robins down in the river bottom draws where we deer hunt in December. If you see one robin there will be several hundred of them in the draw. They group up in large numbers during the winter.

http://www.birds.cornell.edu/AllAboutBirds/BirdGuide/American_Robin_dtl.html#map

The heron is probably working creeks and river nearby to get his food.

http://www.birds.cornell.edu/AllAboutBirds/BirdGuide/Great_Blue_Heron_dtl.html

We have Robins in our timber in NE year round.

we have a few trees blooming here already

We saw a couple of Monarch butterflies the other day. They are migrating North. They might be wise to get a motel room and hole up here for awhile.