Robins Sure Do Dress up a Lawn

O wonderful surprise: a flock of robins, pulling inch after inch of earthworms from the soggy strip between one of Marietta College's administration buildings and Putnam Street. I pulled over and shot a few pictures. No, they're not the first robins of spring; they're nomadic, winter robins, wandering around eating hawthorns and, when drenching rains thaw the soil, availing themselves of earthworms. Robins make me so happy. We're so lucky to have this big, strong, beautiful thrush as a common city bird. It doesn't have to be so lovely, but it is...and its song is one of my very favorites. George Sutton's favorite bird song was a robin, after a thunderstorm. I can think of very few bird songs as evocative as that of a damp robin.

I spent the day in town, ricocheting around, procuring food, and meeting Bill for a late lunch at the natural foods shop and cafe in town. I'm almost as thankful for Brighter Day as I am for robins; it would be so easy for a small town like Marietta not to have a hippie food store. But there it is, and I love the food they serve and the arcane edibles we can buy there (I'm on a spirulina shake kick lately). There's something about eating soybeans and algae for two meals a day that feels right to me. Yep, algae. Now that's eating low on the food chain.

Got home just in time to put everything away, collect Chet, and go meet the bus. If I drive eight minutes to meet them partway, I can save the kids 30 minutes on the bus. With the finely-tuned consciousness of dogs, Chet knows the very minute we must leave to pick them up, and he comes to get me, eyes dancing with anticipation. He trembles when he spots the bus, every muscle rigid, and he moans softly when he spots the kids emerging. He washes their faces and by his careful inspection of their skin and clothes, I'm sure he can smell their friends on them, what they had for lunch, the disinfectant in the hall, and what was being served in the cafeteria. Oh, to be a dog just for a day, so I could know all that, too. With the kids home, it was finally time for the Loop. I take his leash as a formality, just in case we run across cattle. He loves to grab his leash and romp with it. He wears it for about 30 seconds as we approach the overlook where there might be cattle, and then I free him again. He covers enormous distances chasing squirrels, deer and sometimes turkeys. If I ran the miles he did on every walk, I wouldn't have to be eating algae for breakfast and lunch.
My motto for 2006 is DO MORE, EAT LESS. I've been living it since the day we got home from our Thanksgiving trip to Maryland. I felt, in my friend Cindy the Forester's words, "like a one pound package of Jimmy Dean Sausage. The only difference is that I am clad in denim and fleece instead of plastic and not wound quite so tight on the ends!" Oh, thank you, Cindy, for that image, a sausage walking through the woods...for the record, she's perfectly proportioned...It's amazing how little food we actually need. My dad liked to say that a handful of parched corn could keep a Civil War soldier marching all day. At least that's what he would say as he was stealthily trying to commandeer the stove so he could parch corn. Parched corn is a crispier version of the old maids from the bottom of the popcorn pan, but I loved it. As I think back on it, I was very faithful to my dad and his antique and bizarre notions, and he enlisted me to shield himself from the dubious looks he got from my mom when he tried to do anything in the kitchen. He grew soybeans to eat long before soybeans were cool. He got me to shell them (what a pain) and I remember proclaiming to the rest of the family that I thought they were delicious.

So I've come full circle, back to the humble soybean. I heard an item on Morning Edition today that farmers from the American Midwest are buying up enormous tracts (think 8,000 acres and up) of the "scrubland" of northeastern Brazil, and planting them to soybeans. The story was upbeat about enormous yields and cheap land, running about $275/acre; "ideal for agriculture." (The six-month dry season notwithstanding, apparently). The obvious questions were never raised. It left me wondering just how long that land would be ideal for soybeans before we simply ruin it. There's got to be a reason it's "scrubland," not lush tallgrass prairie like our Great Plains breadbasket once had. I guess this is a story whose epilogue has yet to be written. But it made me sad, all the same, knowing that there are habitats in that so-called wasteland, birds and animals and insects and plants unique to them, and that they are being burned away, and turned under for quick profit. We make the same mistakes over and over and over, but we have to go farther afield to make them now.

Kinkade Does Appalachia

The day started out with a good laugh. Chet is confined behind a baby gate at night so he'll sleep in his own very cushy doggie bed. We do this for various reasons; at first it was to make sure he didn't get obnoxious about insisting on invading guests' beds; then it was because if he is going to hurl, he always does it in bed; and now it's for all those reasons, with the additional factor that he farts all night. Released in the morning, though, he makes a beeline for the nearest warm bed, and his job is to awaken Phoebe with a smile. It is very hard to extract a warm Boston from deep cover. He spent the entire day swaddled, emerging twice to go outside and eat. By late afternoon, we were both ready for a hike, rain and thick fog notwithstanding. I couldn't wait to get out. The woods were absolutely silent but for dripping limbs. I put an extra-jingly collar on Chet so I could hear him if we got separated, because the leaves were like sodden Kleenex. Good thing, too. Just past our property line, Chet took off after a squirrel, and, since he couldn't hear my footsteps in the leaves, he didn't know where to find me. I pressed on for a few hundred yards, thinking he'd figure it out in time, but the woods looked spookier with every turn of the trail.I thought about coyotes. I always think about coyotes when I'm out with Chet. So I turned back, and there he was, in the meadow where he'd last seen me, watching for me. Smart guy. Reunited, we forged on through the fog, enjoying the intense, shivery colors, so saturated against the neutral sky.

Finally, we came to the bottom of the Chute, just as dark was coming on. A little log cabin, now covered in asbestos shingles, was lit with a single dim light. I had a Thomas Kinkade moment--if Kinkade painted Appalachian scenes. In this famous schlockartist's heavily trademarked "Twilight Cottages," there's always a glimmering light, and light shimmering on little cobblestone paths and arched stone bridges, drifts of pinkyblue flowers and little babbling brooks. Where I come from, the last light of day skips over tumbling rivulets of Mountain Dew bottles and plastic jugs, which have been thrown out the back door, since that's how Daddy always done it.


Finally, we came up through the orchard, and I sa w glimmering lights that do warm my heart. Phoebe's voice came loud and clear over the walkie-talkie we use to keep in touch while I'm on my peregrinations. "Where are the Goldfish, Mommy?" From out in the orchard, I watched her rummaging in the cabinets in the warm orange light of the kitchen. Now that was a Kinkade moment. Next, I want to walk the Loop on a full moon, in the snow. You'll be the first to know if I do.

More Dog Games

We had an epic bout of the game Moving Scooby-Doo yesterday. It was sunny, one of the handful of sunny days in the past month, and my best friend Shila came over for a walk around the Loop. Well, I guess you could call it a walk, although Shila and I collapsed to the ground to soak up the rare winter sun about every 50 feet... Inspired by two people to root for him, Chet carried Scooby down a steep hill, along the trail through head-high sumac, and almost to the turn in the trail where we descend to the Chute. It was amazing. At this rate we'll get Scooby home long before spring. Shila really digs Chet, and the feeling's mutual. Truth be told, he loves everyone--almost. I've seen Chet refuse to approach only one person, and that was a man who hunts and traps and is sometimes heard yelling at his dog. No such fear with Shila, friend to all living things. In this blog, I'm featuring her photography. Since I'm always behind the lens, it's hard to get a picture of myself self-actualizing.It's cool to see my world through someone else's camera lens. Here's Shila's photo of Chet, scanning the overlook for chaseable cattle. I think his encounter last month may have cooled his jets on chasing cattle, but I won't know until we come in contact with a herd again. He approaches the scene of his cow-chasing escapade warily now, and I hope that means he'll have more sense next time.
One thing I love doing with Chet is inventing games on the spot. He can be walking through millions of fallen leaves, but hold one up over his head and invite him to jump for it, and it becomes a conquest. This dog is made of Flubber; he can spring like a rubber ball straight up to my chest height. Here, I'm talking to him through a piece of gas line pipe. Whatever the joke, Chet gets it. Fun follows him around like a steaming bowl of Quaker oatmeal.

Our friends Zane and Margaret are wildly imaginative, gracious hosts. They also have the best party favors. As each reveler entered, Zane, a wild New Year's elf, deposited a cup of Fish House Punch in his/her hand, and draped said reveler with some kind of lighted favor--flashing earrings, whistles, necklaces or hats. In the darkened dining room, while psychedelic patterns played on the ceiling, the bobbing, swirling lights on revelers made a dreamscape. Setting the camera to take a three-second exposure, I played paparazzo.
I love these ghostly images, and wish I could include the thumping audio that emanated from enormous speakers hooked up to Zane's iPod.
Before he melted down, Liam demonstrated his fabulous break-dancing moves. Phoebe had festooned his tummy with a cheery New Year's greeting, and he made his rounds with shirt hanging open to display it. A few key piercings and he'd have been a perfect miniature grunge-punk. We're having a New Year's thunderstorm right now--flashing lightning-yikes! I'm drawing warblers, a good thing to do on a rainy January day. I'll leave you with my breakdancing six-year-old, and best wishes for a happy New Year!

Diggity Dog

It was a beautiful day, New Year's, after a rawther wild New Year's eve. We took the kids to a really fun party, not factoring in the reality that they'd been up until midnight the two previous nights. To shorten a long, sad story, they melted down around 11, and we celebrated the New Year as we rolled into our garage with two completely zonked kids in the back seat. It was a bit of a downer, since country folk like us rarely get out to dance and act dopey with our buddies. I wasn't good for much but the day dawned sunny and still, so my friend Shila and I went out with Chet Baker on a long lazy walk around the Loop. Chet thought this was a fine idea and darted about, smelling things we could only imagine. He stepped on an ant hill, noted the soft soil, and decided to investigate. I was quickly covered with a spray of fine soil as it flew out behind him. Having grown up with a dachshund who, over his 12-year life span excavated most of a 5-acre woodland, I found Chet's efforts amusing. He was proud of his work, though, and paused to gaze nobly around with his dirty nose, like a champion racehorse who has just come in off a muddy track. It brought back memories of old Volks, who would come staggering home after an entire Saturday's work, his eyes two wet dark spots in a mask of red Virginia soil. Be ing a Boston terrier, Chet has been bred not for any honest work but merely for companionship and fun, so he doesn't get too wrapped up in any one pursuit. If he has a job, it is to make us laugh, and that he takes very seriously.I took down the Christmas tree tonight. Chet lay watching me with a worried brow, hoping that I would decide to give him an ornament to chew. He filched a chipping sparrow's nest that was lined with Phoebe's red hair clippings, a prize from years back, and chewed that up while I wasn't looking. I know that sleeping right next to the Christmas tree has been a kind of torture for him, festooned as it is with things of felt, wood, and fiber, things that really beg to be chewed up. But he never bothered any of them until he saw me taking it down. I believe he thought I was throwing the ornaments out at that point (hence the worried look) and that it would probably be OK if he took just one.
Early to bed for all of us tonight. I'll check to see if I have any good images from last night, tomorrow, when I'm awake enough to download them. Until then...

Cavalcade of Guests

Howdy! The Hostest withthe Mostest Dirty Dishes in her Kitchen is back. We've had back-to-back houseguests this week, and more fun in that lax week between Christmas and New Year's that I can remember. First came Clay Taylor, one of my oldest friends from Connecticut days. I think we met in 1982, when we were both really skinny proto-professional birders. We shared many a dinner and rare bird sightings, and it has been a delight to watch Clay grow up, have kids, and get a real job (for me, one out of three of those apply) with Swarovski Optik as their birding specialist. As a result, we get to see Clay several times a year, more than we see my family, for goodness' sake, as we haunt many of the same birding festivals. It's such a treat to have him visit, though! We could yak around the clock, and nearly did. Here's Clay, with Baker alap. If you visit us, you have to put up with having a 20-lb Boston unexpectedly launch himself into your lap. So far, nobody's objected. Clay's adorable red-headed daughter Gracie, just 13, was a perfect match for Phoebe.To top off all the fun, Clay and Gracie rolled up in a rented PT Cruiser, a car that has achieved cult status in our family. We play a game we call PT Loser, in which we all try to spot the cars and blurt out their color and any special fea tures before anyone else spots it. It makes trips go much faster. Extra points for flames, wood sides, or the omnipresent Dangling Dice. Phoebe and I had a fashion shoot in the Taylor's fabulous Loser.

'Twas not to be long before my even longer-lost friend from college, Martha Weiss, showed up with wonderful husband Josh Rosenthal and beyond-adorable daughters Annie and Isabel. The kids formed a pack and played Extreme Hide and Seek in our cavernous and confusing house, occasionally getting themselves so well-hidden as to need adult intervention. Martha came packing menorah, candles, Hanukah geld, and little presents for everyone. Our kids heartily embraced this new ritual, and loved lighting the candles and searching for their presents afterward.
Martha is a self-described "lapsed botanist" who is breaking new ground in the field of insect learning and behavior. Her doctoral dissertation was on butterfly learning, wherein she shed new light on color-changing flowers, the signals they send to pollinators, and the speed and alacrity with which butterflies pick up on those signals. From there, she has become fascinated with caterpillars, especially those, like the skippers, that construct houses for themselves. Management of their own droppings is a problem for sedentary larvae, and Martha is studying the various ways the caterpillar s clean house. Silver-spotted skipper larvae can shoot a poop pellet as much as five feet--ptoooo! Learning things like this makes my canary chirp, and we had the most fascinating, never-ending conversations about bug behavior, and the many parallels with bird behavior. Our poop-shooting discussion segued into a dissertation on fecal sacs--all this over dinner. We decided that two days and nights exploring such topics just wasn't enough, so we're making plans for a week this coming summer.A luna moth pancake. Easier to eat than to make. Martha took orders from the kids.

One of the things I love most about Martha is the creativity and flair that she brings to the most pedestrian activities. Cooking with Martha is an adventure; it was she who first showed me how to pop sesame seeds (like tiny popcorn!), who introduced me to red quinoa (the little embryos in the seeds spiral out when it's steamed), who gave me my first Granny Smith apple in 1977. Friends with whom one has a history are priceless treasures. To have our children emailing madly back and forth in advance of their visit, and then playing giddily together in our home, is a joy beyond measure.

A train pancake for a very excited Liam. His mommy never made an interesting pancake in her life before now. Thanks so much, Martha. I'll remember you next Sunday, when I'm trying to make a railroad trestle out of Bisquick.

The Bird Connection

This is Bela, on his first afternoon of freedom. He came back at sundown to chat and sip a little nectar from an eyedropper. It was clear he didn't need to eat, he just wanted to say hello. Funny, so did I!

Well, it's been a thrilling day. "When Hummingbirds Come Home," the commentary that aired on All Things Considered last night, is #1 on the NPR website's 25 Most E-mailed Stories. Not only that, but "My Hummingbird Summer," the prequel to this one, which aired last April, is #16! Which means that people are emailing the sequel, and then they're looking up the prequel, and emailing that, and it's all just a bit much to believe.

Magic atop magic: Sitting in my kitchen right now is Martha Weiss, fabulous college friend. We've not seen each other for 23 years. But she heard me on the radio, and looked me up, and we've been in touch since. Our husbands are yakking; our kids are all having a slumber party in the tower room as I write.

While I was fixing shrimp curry for dinner, my dear friend Grace Shohet called from San Francisco. She'd heard it, too. We haven't spoken for eight years, and she has an 8-year-old daughter I've never seen!

At the root of these little reunions is a powerful story--the story of hummingbirds that made a real connection with human beings. Knowing an individual bird is a powerful thing. We all yearn to know birds, I think, to make that vital connection with an individual. Raising a young bird, we're let in on a big surprise: they think, they reason, they recognize us--and they bond with us. Birds are anything but feathered automatons. They're intelligent, resourceful, and surprisingly affectionate beings. I've raised robins, bluebirds, mourning doves, cardinals, chimney swifts; a starling, a catbird, a wood thrush, a cedar waxwing, a rose-breasted grosbeak, five hummingbirds. They all bonded with me; I think they all needed to know they were loved, and they returned it. Unscientific? You bet. But they all returned successfully to the wild, and most of them came back to visit, sometimes for years on end.

Amazing what happens when your voice comes out of people's car radios. I feel so blessed.

Hummer, Come Home!

Here are some of the color studies I made of the birds while they were in my care.


I had a commentary air on NPR's All Things Considered tonight. Normally, my editor lets me know in advance when something's going to air. She's really terrific about it. I imagine she's on vacation, and someone else pulled this off the shelf. It's not exactly seasonal, but maybe they figured we could use a bit of summer...who am I to argue? Like most everyone else, I missed it, but the story is up on the NPR web site, with audio. There's also a cute picture. The commentary's titled "When Hummingbirds Come Home." It's a sequel to "My Hummingbird Summer," which aired April 4, 2005. Briefly, Phoebe and I raised four baby ruby-throated hummingbirds that were blown out of their nesting trees by a thunderstorm. The calls came in to the Bird Watcher's Digest office on the same July morning. One was injured in the fall, and never flew, but the other three fledged successfully, hung around the yard charming the bejabbers out of us for about another month and a half, then migrated. The next spring, all three- males now in resplendant breeding plumage--CAME BACK. I can't think of a better reward for feeding baby birds, dawn to dusk, every 20 minu tes for three weeks, can you?

Man, I love it when commentaries air. This is my 18th since July of 2004. So that's about one per month. If you've got time to kill and the interest, here's a link to all the Zickefoose commentaries. Woo-hoo! I'm a happy girl tonight.

My Dog Period

Sometimes I feel like Picasso in his Blue Period. I'm in my Dog Period, I guess, because I'm endlessly fascinated by the photo ops that Chet provides. It's hard to capture Chet with his Goofy Grin because he's a blur of black, white and pink, and I'm usually laughing too hard to hold the camera. More tranquil moments are much better fodder for this camera, which has a two-second delay between when I press the shutter button and when it actually records that long-gone moment. When I first got the digi-camera it was incredibly frustrating; I'd always prided myself on capturing the moment as it happened with my film SLR camera. Now I take a scatter-shot approach to photography. I click and click and out of a batch of ten there might be a good shot, and the accidents are often more interesting than the setups. I absolutely love digital photography. I set the sucker on Automatic and fire away. I let it worry about lighting and exposure and I just go for the moment. Chet likes to sit on people. He also likes to stick his butt in your face, something we refer to as "butting." Since his all-but-vestigal tail is permanently decurved, being butted by Chet is not nearly as obnoxious as being butted by a cat, for instance. Well, usually not. I've decided to ask Chet's breeder if there is a gene for flatule nce, because Chet is expressing that gene in a big, big way. He can hotbox you under the covers until you scream for mercy. From Liam, sitting next to me, coloring: "Hey, Mom. Please don't laugh. I'm trying to concentrate."

Chewing a bone on something, whether it be a pillow, your book, your knee, your head, or anything Liam is trying to play with, is another quirk of Chet's. Try to wrap a package, put together a wooden train track, or read the funnies on the floor, and Chet dashes to get a chew bone, flops down on whatever you're working with, and chews away. As a result, the countertops in our house are festooned with howling monkeys, squeak frogs, eviscerated Teletubbies, and the like, because the kids get tired of being interfered with and retaliate by putting the chew toy up where Chet can't reach it.
Well, it's a beautiful sunny afternoon, and my Loop trail is calling. We're in a brief lull between houseguests and I should be straightening and cleaning and planning meals, but you don't often get 55-degree days in December. There are Men in Orange swarming the woods the last couple of days. I don't know what season just opened--perhaps Kill Antlerless Deer with Butterknives Season--but I'm going to defy them, and hope that Chet and I emerge alive to blog again. Ta!