On our walk today Jake and I saw some mallards -- two pairs, although the very shaky video only captures one pair, with a chorus of frogs in the background.
I can't believe this pond sustains any life (I call it the Sludge Pond); I'd hate to fall in it, and I don't let Jake wade in it, either.
My notes from last year indicate that on March 31, we also saw mallards and heard frogs -- and saw a flicker and a woodchuck. I didn't take photos on our walks last March, so some photos of the same animals sighted recently will have to represent them.
I'm fond of woodchucks. I may be the only one who is, but the one who lived in a burrow under my neighbor's shed persuaded me. We called him "Chuck," but we eventually had to change that to "Charlene" when four (the most I saw at one time, anyway) absolutely adorable baby woodchucks appeared one May 7, popping up out of the burrow in twos and threes like Muppets. I learned that the males leave as soon as they're able, but a female from the litter usually stays with the mother for an entire season before moving on; I did observe this, watching mother and daughter graze together through the summer and early fall that year.
I also love Flickers. Having grown up in Chicago, I thought there were only sparrows, robins and starlings. Oh, and pigeons, of course. Stepping out of one's Central Illinois House and seeing/hearing a Flicker is splendid. They're unmistakable. I've discovered other wonderful birds since expatriating from the city -- but those stories will wait.
Yesterday Jake surprised a fox squirrel, which ran up a tree and scolded him, hanging upside down from what seems to be incredibly precarious purchase on the bark. Both gray and fox squirrels are everywhere in Oak Ridge Cemetery, and in the Spring they act frankly squirrelly. I love to watch them chase each other up, down and around tree trunks, sometimes suddenly breaching the quiet with their chatter.
Plants are sending up sprouts, trees are budding. It's an ebullient, hopeful season.
