Streams

I am not sure how to do it. How does one capture the fluidity of deep contentment? That place where you are aware of being completely in the moment but having that moment enriched and connected by the flow, and reflection of, and upon, conversations just passed, of music simply heard, of laughter deeply felt and of beauty.

Last weekend I travelled to Rougemont Abbey and Abbaye de Saint-Benoît-du-Lac. My friend and I listened to a choir being rehearsed to the point we felt sorry for the choir members. Then when they performed in the Saint Benoit Du Lac Abbey their voices were one in Gregorian Chant . It was stunning. The monks clapped! We listened to the evening vespers of the thirty nine monks living in the abbey and my awareness was awakened to a different way of being in Peace.

My friend and I spoke of Abelard and Heloise, of Hildegard and Buddhism. 

Sunday Sunday morning I drove from Ottawa to meet with geophysicists working in a local cemetery, came home, prepared a meal of tomato pie, buffalo chicken slivers, Greek salad, and fresh fruit salad with whipped cream. The conversation with the geophysicists was of sediment patterns with glacial recession, sand to slate to clay, of “fracking”, of mid-terms, Queens cyclists’ victory and of cats. 

When I rose this morning to a cloud free sun it was time for Alanagh Molly and me to go to the sandstones and to be with the tall grasses, to see the last blooming Queen Anne’s Lace and the aspens dotted with unknown warblers. To feel the fluidity of deep contentment in our moments together.

St. Benoit du Lac

Pine Siskins

Female American Goldfinch

American Tree Sparrow

Some kind of feather grass ? and goldenrod to the left

The last of the Lace

Hartsgravel road sandstones

Shades of the North

After what seemed like an endless ten days of feeling ill, I had the great pleasure to rejoin the birder group on our travel down back roads in search of the elusive. Today was a remarkable one for me for I learned about pine siskins. I am quite sure I may have known about them before but any trace of that knowledge was in deep hiding.

Every couple of years, these beautiful little birds make unpredictable flights called irruptions into southern and eastern North America. Cornell University ornithology site informs me that, “Though they’re erratic, these movements may not be entirely random. Banding data suggest that some birds may fly west-east across the continent while others move north-south. 

I always feel thrilled to see ravens here because, in part, they remind me of my time in Fort William now Thunder Bay. Those years of discovery, in a part of Ontario unfamiliar to me, left indelible impressions for which I continue to be grateful.

I send to you today lovely old roads, a raven, a painted turtle, monkshood, and siskins.

The Raven in memory of Gary Ironside.

Monkshood

Pine Siskin

Crows end

My dear daughter Emily: My aficionado of all things crows, saved my all time favourite crow shot that I sent to her in 2006! I took this crow (same one I sent to you earlier ) sitting on a wire while I was living on the St. Lawrence. It clearly did not like the sound of the camera shutter, and flew right at me to investigate the long lens, I think. I quickly got in my car and it veered off.  Over to you now.

Thank you Emily

Encore crows

Many of my friends have commented on a video I sent out about crows yesterday. I wonder if much of our identification with crows is associated with Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven”. I have lost my all time favourite shot a crow flying straight at me and hope perhaps my daughter Emily still has a copy for she is a crow aficionado. If there is anything you need to know about crows she is the “go to person”. 

Clever crows are gregarious, and live in family groups of up to fifteen members. In most families the young crows help their parents raise further broodings. Juvenile crows will stay in the family unit for up to five years. They will not mate until they are two years old.  Three to seven eggs, with four or five being the average, are laid in a large nest (over half a metre in diameter and twenty three centimetres high) prepared in a crotch of a tree. The outer part of the nest is made mostly of dead branches but it is the interior “cup” made of softer material where the eggs are laid.  The eggs vary in colour and pigment even in a single clutch from bluish green to pale olive, marked with brown and gray but can be unmarked sky blue.

We see crows on the roadsides forging on the fallen, however, interestingly enough to me, their beaks are not strong enough to break the skin of mammals. They have to wait until some event or other scavenger has made the way clear to softer tissues. This is perhaps too much information so I will lighten up!

Our territorial ebony creatures maintain their collective territory year round, however individuals frequently leave to join large flocks at dumps and fields and sleep in large roosts in the winter. Records show up to two million crows in a roost. Now that is a murder of crows!

Over to crows:

To Chickadees

Chickadees always make me smile. They are curious wee bits of life whose behaviour is familiar to most of us. Chickadees are often the first bird learned by children and adults alike. When I see cavities in trees I invariably wonder what might be in them, and surprisingly I might find a chickadee sleeping there even in the blackest cold of winter. They come to my feeder and bring other types of small song birds  with them like nuthatches, woodpeckers, kinglets, warblers and vireos. Although I can not tell who is who in a flock, the flock is hierarchal, and there are some chickadees called “winter floaters” and they join other flocks. Winter floater status changes from flock to flock. 

These delightful creatures are no slouches when it comes to brain power! Every fall, Black-capped chickadees' neurons containing old information die and are replaced with new neurons, allowing them to adapt to changes in their social flock and the environment. They often hide their seeds and can remember thousands of locations.

I would be quite happy with a “refresh” of my neurons!

changing focus

For Mr. French: Do you know this guy?