Diario de tomdemouth

It is indeed still winter, this Tuesday the 3rd of March was a blistery day with clear gray skies. At around 12:30 pm I went out to our beloved centennial woods. I went all the way to the commuter lot and was going into the farthest entrance to be among the conifers. While I was on my way there, still in sight of the Doubletree, I heard the soft cawing of an American crow, it was rather far away flying through the air heading northeast.
I wanted to head this way because it was an area with a lot of conifers and it also has a large opening for the telephone/electricity poles that run through it. The conifers because during the winter they are used to host the birds, sheltering them from the snow and rain. It also allows the birds to retain more body heat while hunting for seeds and winter berries. American Crow's might not have the same affiliation to conifers as the smaller birds do. The Black-capped Chickadee I saw later in the walk relies on them more.
As I walked through this part of the woods there are many many snags, the first one not 60 feet from the trail. It was an older snag the tree missing all the bark and there were many cavities, on just one side it had 16 cavities. All of the cavities were small and round looking like the same animal or same species made them. After this snag there were 11 more I saw along my walk, each showed signs of cavities made by a similar animal.
Snags are extremely important in terms of wildlife, as well as general forest health. They provide habitat to many insect species and help provide food for larger organisms, such as birds. The snags also eventually fall turning into downed woody debris which is important for similar reasons. As well as helping the forest retain nutrients, carbon, and can even be a nursery log for species such as yellow birch. Woodpeckers are a great example of birds that can use snags to feed and nest. Other animals use these cavities to nest as well as bats.

I went out on March 21st, it was a bitterly cold day out ranging just below freezing. There wasn't any precipitation but it was windy and cloudy out. I walked to Centennial woods from east ave down there was actually a high amount of bird activity for it being a cold and blistery day.

My birds were all grouped up and while, not chatting they were chirping back and forth. There are many audio clues that were audible including danger calls and warnings to, me the potential predator. I saw a Black-capped Chickadee as well as a Northern Cardinal, they each have an advantage in different ways. The chickadee can blend into the environment and is better at surviving predators, while the cardinal's color helps it to attract mates and show dominance.

While walking to the woods I encountered multiple American Robins all of whom looked like they were angry they came up this early to find Vermont still very cold. They did not appreciate the pishing. One thing that I noticed was their warning calls were social, each bird responded and when I got closer it got louder and a faster speed. Also it felt like the male robins were flying out in front of me attempting to distract me or something along those lines, they flew right in front of me just out of my reach multiple times. I am curious if they were attempting to protect any females or were they just playing a game with each other to see who could get closest to me.

While pishing I did feel rather foolish, and I am not very good at getting wildlife, especially birds, to do what I want alas it seemed to startle most of the chickadees I got near. However some of them where able to overcome the beard and forbearing posture and they came to see what in the world I was doing. The first times I tried to do it they flew away in fear but the time it worked they were curious about what I was doing. While pishing I tried to dig into the shhh sound and almost whistled it to sound more bird like.