Arboretum Diary

"Silent and quite lifeless as we approach it, it'll start to live as soon as it thinks we've gone, because we're as quiet as it is." Renard, "The Sparrow"











3-26


At the hour when the rain stops and the wildlife anticipates some time for open hunting, the birds come out as if on cue and early spring chorus begins in earnest.  We had entered the Wingra Spring Parking Lot, a very common trail which leads to a less than common marshland surrounding this edge of the Lake. Here are natural springs and where they bubble up through the mantle and flow on into the lake, through underbrush, reeds, cattails and bulrush, it leaves a blindingly green trail of what looks to be water clover. Needless to say this spring trail must be a boon for birds of all seasons. Finches and titmouse hover over the thin branches skittering from place to place, likely eyeing up our invasion the space known to them as the great bath, seeds trickling over rocks, insects rising to the

surface as if self-advertisement for a free meal.  Along the two-inch thick mud trail, through a mix of oak, pine and occasional birch, a Downy Woodpecker bobbles against the tough and ancient crust of an oak.  A few steps forward up on the very tops of three old pines stumps, overlooking the marsh as if sentries, are three turkey vultures, steady as statues for the moment.  So the cycle has begun. Seeing these large New World Vultures from the back looks very much like the back side of golden eagles. As we saw only one initially, we thought it possible, but then saw the other two stationed at around 20 foot intervals, shaking their wings from the recent rain.  The binoculars revealed the greatest obvious difference between the two species, the red ugly head in comparison to the stealthy and stoic head of the golden eagle.  As one jumped from its perch through a forest underbrush that was still void of its leaves, it was easy to hear the vast flap of the wings against the silence.  No doubt in this northern climate, recently landed from migration, this large bird comes to Wisconsin considerably hungry and what better place to wait your turn at the table than a fresh marsh spring.