tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-50546578161883369392011-12-26T13:49:34.846-05:00BWDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14794585161009679257noreply@blogger.comBlogger91100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5054657816188336939.post-2460763556116454692009-04-23T17:38:00.001-04:002009-04-23T17:42:12.494-04:00

Spring 1970: Freshman year at Ohio State University. A guy in zoology class asks me to go bird watching. He'll pick me up Saturday, and we'll head south of Columbus to study migrants for his Ornithology 401 midterm. Pat arrives in a rag-tag Rambler station wagon. It chugs to a state park, and we select a narrow, wooded trail. I carry no-name binoculars redeemed with S&H Green Stamps. Monstrous

BWDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14794585161009679257noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5054657816188336939.post-6997237989536044252009-04-23T17:04:00.001-04:002009-04-23T17:11:22.493-04:00

The year was 1973. I was working at the Sleep Disorders Center at Stanford University and living in a tiny cottage in an older section of Palo Alto, California. I regarded my little abode as charming, though admittedly it was rather run down – clearly a fix-up special – but what I liked most about it was that it couldn't be seen from the street. A labyrinth of shrubbery – much of it dead and in

BWDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14794585161009679257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5054657816188336939.post-12394810446533643742009-01-12T14:43:00.006-05:002009-01-12T15:07:09.627-05:00

"Grandpa! Grandpa!" The year was 1950, and I was running down the path that led to the Baby Beach where my grandfather was working in his garden. The garden down at the beach was his favorite place in the world – unless, of course, he was out in Flatty, fishing for lake trout. In 1919, Grandpa bought 100 acres of waterfront property on Lake of Bays, in the Muskoka district of southern Ontario.

BWDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14794585161009679257noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5054657816188336939.post-19883248795762910602009-01-12T14:16:00.002-05:002009-01-12T14:20:16.539-05:00

As a kid, I was a deadly predator. I spent hours and hours hunting and fishing. Even though Dad was a wildlife photographer and I worked for him in summer – mostly doing errands and yard chores – I had little if any interest in cameras or birds. The few photos I took under Dad's direction did not ignite passion.My lack of interest in photography continued through college where I majored in

BWDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14794585161009679257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5054657816188336939.post-53833816632146372232008-11-20T15:30:00.001-05:002008-11-20T15:31:55.613-05:00

My spark bird was a warbler. I was about eight, and I heard the sound of small wings splashing in a seep in the forest behind my house in Richmond, Virginia. The pool was surrounded by catbrier, and I remember dropping to my stomach to crawl toward the sound. I peeked through the vegetation and saw a blue-winged warbler in the sunlight, bathing madly. It was brilliant yellow, with a tiny black

BWDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14794585161009679257noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5054657816188336939.post-21651999503351504722008-11-20T15:12:00.002-05:002008-11-20T15:14:30.996-05:00

I came into bird-watching in a casual sort of way, occasioned by the initial interest of my wife, who, as a kindergarten teacher, decided to add a unit on birds to her lesson plans. With her leading the way, we bought a pair of binoculars, a rudimentary bird guide, and then a more advanced one. There was nothing hardcore about this activity at first. The book and field glasses would be tossed

BWDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14794585161009679257noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5054657816188336939.post-17158683981626451752008-09-30T13:22:00.007-04:002008-09-30T16:08:31.493-04:00

On a sun-splendored day in early September the young boy went outside to play in the yard of his parents' Maryland farm. But something he saw held his attention captive almost as soon as he ran out the door of the old clapboard house. Just to the right of where the dirt and grass driveway entered the yard was a tall thistle with full purple blossoms. On one of them was a brilliant, small bird,

BWDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14794585161009679257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5054657816188336939.post-18010540914348304242008-09-22T11:49:00.006-04:002008-09-30T16:41:07.978-04:00

I don't know that I had an epiphany that suddenly ignited an interest in birds. Something in me is hardwired to be smitten with nature, and birds were my first source of fascination. This passion for all things feathered was already imbedded in my psyche by the time I was in early elementary school, maybe 7 or 8 years old.The closest recollection I have to a "spark bird" involves nothing

BWDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14794585161009679257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5054657816188336939.post-40460711271950187562008-09-21T11:45:00.001-04:002008-09-30T16:17:25.988-04:00

A yellow warbler lit in my willow tree one long-ago August day and I have never been the same since.I didn't know it was a yellow warbler, of course. Unlike my husband Bill, whose interest in birds had begun long before with his Eagle Scout requirement of a bird-study merit badge, I had never paid attention to birds at all. Oh sure, I remembered my mother's putting out crumbs for the cardinals

BWDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14794585161009679257noreply@blogger.com0