Tis the season

In a matter of days grass turned green, tree buds appeared (and leaves followed), flowers and weeds bloomed and lawns were mowed. Golfers are already frustrated. Temperatures sometimes reached the 80s.

Where we live male goldfinches have turned bright yellow and (common) grackles have arrived in numbers to overwhelm bird feeders. Wild turkeys across the road gobble every morning and evening.

It must be spring!

But let's not get ahead of ourselves!

This morning's low was close to freezing. Baseball's opening day is not yet a week past. Mother's Day is a month away and we still need April showers to bring May flowers.

Joel Satore

I have again been reminded of Nebraskans who work tirelessly on issues involving conservation and preservation at the international, national and state levels. I appreciate their efforts and believe those individuals are worthy of praise for their good work.

Joel Satore is one such Nebraskan.

Behind his many, highly regarded picture assignments for National Geographic and numerous photography books, Satore has embarked on a project to photograph the 6,000 animal, insect, reptilian, amphibian species captive in American zoos to create of record of what animal species used to be a part of our world. This self-assigned and self-funded project is garnering, as it should, both national and local attention. For example, earlier this month his project was the subject of a segment on the NBC Nightly News and last Sunday’s Lincoln Journal Star had a feature article on the project.

While the attention is welcome as a means of increasing awareness of the often-fragile state of wildlife, that such a project is necessary is very disappointing.

The Journal Star article reports there are 1.25 million animal species and half of those are predicted to be extinct by the end of the century. And the species expected to die away include such well-known and treasured animals as panda, polar bear and woodland caribou. What a shame!

An almost unimaginable sight

Each year Sandhills cranes arrive in Nebraska on their way to the artic from Texas and Mexico. The Nebraska stop, which can last for weeks, enables the cranes to fatten up and gather strength for the harsh conditions of the far north.

Daytime finds the cranes, numbering in the thousands (and that is no exaggeration), in cornfields and prairies feeding. At sunset those thousands of cranes begin their nightly flight to the Platte River. They remain there all night roosting in the river’s extremely shallow water standing on very long legs, all the while dancing and honking and clucking with their several foot long tracheas.

Sharleen and I, for the first time, took the opportunity last Thursday to experience the majesty and beauty of those thousands of cranes descending on the Platte to roost. Our two hours in the blind was an experience unlike any we have had in our lives and almost defies description. Next year we hope to return next year to experience the sunrise departure of the cranes from the river for another day of gorging.

You should join us.

A rare day

Sharleen taking a day off occurs rarely. But she did just that last Wednesday and we made the most of it.

We spent most of the day purchasing needed items for the house. The most important was, in anticipation of the arrival of our new bedroom furniture within a month, a queen size mattress and box springs and sheets. Now, with one big exception, we are ready for that bedroom furniture to arrive. The big exception is we have no lamps or overhead light for that room.  We do have multiple flashlights and a lantern.

Returning home from our excursion we found a delivered package containing Sharleen’s newly ordered binoculars. With their arrival we are ready for our trip west on the 15^th of March for Sandhills crane watching. That trip has both of us excited.

I am also excited about recent deer tracks in the snow and a new identified bird species, a White-Breasted Nuthatch.

Since then

Since posting “Stay Tuned” I have visited the Nebraska History Museum to take in the exhibit about Nebraska’s involvement in early aviation.

I was disappointed.

Learning Charles Lindbergh took flying lessons in Lincoln was interesting. So too was learning Lincoln was home to several airplane manufacturers (none of which survived). But the small exhibit was mostly text, photographs and posters. Physical pieces from the period were few and limited to such things as flying caps, jackets and goggles.

Much more fascinating was an exhibit about Nebraska’s participation in World War II. The exhibit occupies more than one-half of one of the museum’s floors. This exhibit is, in today’s parlance, multi-media utilizing a slide show, photographs and actual radio broadcasts to present Nebraska’s place in the war effort. Period pieces include weapons, uniforms, a military motorcycle and both military and government documents. They are an excellent complement to the “presentation” components and the exhibit is one I can heartily recommend.

Stay tuned

Here I am again without posting anything recently. As unfortunate as it may be, the fact is I have done nothing readers would find interesting. Part of the reason is that although the weather conditions have been unseasonably warm and dry, they have not been so unseasonable as to think spring and do spring things. I have lived in Nebraska long enough to know winter conditions will return.

That said, I have a couple of things I may soon do that I hope are interesting  and worthy of comment.

In no time at all

Our multiple week string of moderate, unseasonal weather conditions has come to an end, and with the strong westerly winds that took those conditions away came a reminder that spring is that much closer now and the time has come to begin checking items off my retirement to do list.

In all of the years we have lived in Nebraska we have never participated in watching the spring migration of Sandhills Cranes in central Nebraska. That is to change this year. We have made reservations for March 15 at one of The Nature Conservancy’s crane watching blinds near the Platte River.

The cranes annually draw thousands of visitors from their arrival in late February through the first part of April. Usually, but subject to the weather, peak numbers occur the second and third week of March. It is no exaggeration to say the cranes’ arrival is perhaps the biggest and most anticipated nature related event of the year in Nebraska.

As excited as I am about the cranes' coming arrival, I don’t have to wait for them to have birds to watch.

My previously mentioned efforts to draw more and more birds to our front yard continue to be successful. Although goldfinches remain the dominant species at the feeder - and it is not uncommon to find a dozen or more of them in our two very small, leaf-barren trees at any one time - I can now report the recurring, just like clockwork, visits of several bird species beside goldfinches. Those other species are black-capped chickadees and finches at the feeder and cardinals, dark-eyed juncos and robins on the ground.

What friends they make.