February
Heavy
rains in the first week of this month raised the creek to
almost five feet deep, but now in the second week the
rain has stopped long enough for the water to return to
it's normal depth. The Canadian Geese are here nearly
every day now and it looks like they intend to stay for
the summer.
Grandfather
blue heron hangs out around the edges of the water every
day. Mrs. Hawk flies in and out of the swamp, terrifying
the ducks every chance she gets. The red wing blackbirds
haven't shown up yet, but they will make their annual
entrance any day now.
One
of the racoons visited our rear deck again, but left soon
after she found no food to rob. She is really big so
probably is not one of the twins born on the other side
of the big middle pond last summer. That is a place Mrs. Coyote often hangs out looking for food.
W
e experienced a rare visit to the swamp in the third week
of February. Two young white herons came twice to visit.
They are probably two of the three young ones (two males
and one female) that hatched last summer and came to
visit several times in the last quarter of 1998.
S
ooner or later it had to happen, the arrival of the
redwing blackbirds. There are only a couple of them right
now, but there will be more. It is curious that they like
to hang out around the swamp, but they don't nest here.
The last week of the month was almost solid rain, the
creek became a four feet deep lake, and we are plagued
again with small land slides behind our house. Lost
several planters so far, but nothing searious.
March
The rain
carried through the last week of february and stopped
this morning, the first week of march. I donned my grubby
shoes and mucked around the sliding bank to see what
damage was done. Found a couple of broken underground drainage pipes. Must have broken during last years
slide. If I can repair those before the next rain,
everything should be ok again. The damaged planters will
have to wait awhile.
It is nice on the deck tonight. No rain
and 55 degrees. Two owls are communicating in the
darkness, "Who ho....ho?" then an answer
"Who hoo....hoo". They seem to speak about the
same language, yet perhaps do not know each other. Who knows?
.....perhaps they are looking for each
other.
That last rain raised the water to five
feet deep, the deepest it has been this year. Average
temperatures have raised ten degrees since early last
month, but day temperatures haven't topped sixty degrees
yet. Sure be glad the weather permits planting to start.
My gardens are small, but I truly enjoy raising
vegetables along with my lawns, bushes, trees and
flowers.
Now in the third week of march the rain
is on and off mixed with brief periods of sun. Today is
March 23 and three interesting events occured on the
swamp today:
There she sets in her favorite tree,
head turning side to side, missing no movement on the
swamp. She seems disinterested in harassing ducks
today. Then she swooped down to the grass and wheeled
upstream, effortlessly rising higher and higher to
the highest limb of the tallest tree at the bend in
the creek. For a couple of minutes she perched there,
then stepped into space and plummited down into the
tall grass. Another small creature of the swamp met
it's untimely death, but Mrs. Hawk survives.
-o-
Two strange birds visited today, a
species I have never seen here, swimming on the big
pond. The male, white on the bottom with black back
and head, a bill more pointed than ducks; the female
a mixture of white, gray and black. They did not look
like ducks, but could have been loons. They made no
sounds to help identify them, but then I don't know
anything about loons anyway. I watched them with my
binoculers until they became spooked and flew away. I
hope they visit again.
-o-
The peaceful coexistence between the
small flock of canadian geese was suddenly shattered.
Five of them were on the creek, two on the far side
of the swamp and three on this side about one hundred
feet from my rear deck. The largest male became upset
and attacked the smaller male. He fogged on the
smaller male and appeared to duck under water and
bite it on the foot.
The victim tried to retreat upstream,
but the bully was all over him. The smaller goose
limped out of the creek and hid motionless in the
tall grass. The bully stood close by just watching
the one in the grass. Then, apperently satisfied he
had won the battle, swam back down stream to join the
female of the group.
The poor traumatized goose hid in the
grass for ten minutes, so still that I feared he had
been seariously injured. Eventually he very
cautiously left the grass, entered the creek and
wisely paddled upstream. It was clear from the raction that he was young, but certainly not dumb.
Meanwhile the bully went out of his
way to attack the third male on the far side of the
creek and proceeded to chase him away from his mate.
That seemed very strange to me because the second
male was mated and showed no interest in the bully's
mate. I haven't known any male goose to have two
mates, but his actions must have seemed reasonable to
him. I guess there has to be one bully in every
flock.
-o-
March is winding down, but winter is
hanging on and summer seems on hold. The wildlife on
the swamp it seems have decided among themselves who
stays and who goes. As it stands on this rainy
sunday, eighteen pairs of birds have decided to stay,
five sets of geese, eleven sets of Mallards, and two
sets of half-pint-diving ducks. Red heads and wood
ducks have visited, but none seem interested in
settling down on this part of the swamp.
An hour ago the geese raised a big
kai yow, so I went out to see what was wrong. Two
nutrias were swimming down stream toward the flock
and the geese were going fruitcake, leaving the water
and watching the rodents suspiciously as they paddled
by. Soon the nutrias disappeared around the bend and
the geese stopped honking. Within minutes they were
back browsing the water as if nothing unusual had
happened. Just another day on the Council Creek
Swamp.
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