American Crow hunting acorns
I spotted this American Crow having a delightful time watching all of the action around it as more American Crows plus Blue Jays, squirrels and chipmunks all eagerly grabbed countless acorns under an oak tree. In this shot it almost seemed like it was gleefully sizing up the tree, taking an account of how much stock was left in this giant store. There are feeding frenzies going on all around us with wildlife storing food for the winter during a very helpful warm November stretch. That is about to end as colder than average temperatures are coming for the mid-month with some snow in the...
Read MoreBlue Jays on the move?
Whether I have been in New York, Pennsylvania or Connecticut recently it feels like everywhere I turn I see a Blue Jay. Whether it’s one, two, several or more they are filling up every bit of land they can find. I mean this quite literally – every time I walk outside of RTPI it seems as if there are Blue Jays active all over the place. Considering the calendar it occurred to me that we are probably experiencing an influx of migrant Blue Jays. Being such common backyard birds and a widely adaptable species it can be difficult to discern when a Blue Jay movement is taking place. We...
Read MoreJune temperatures and precipitation
Having spent time in New York, Pennsylvania and Connecticut in different parts of June I heard a variety of classifications about the late spring and early summer temperature and precipitation conditions. The Northeast region had varied weather and even more mixed opinions on what it felt like outside during the month. To those back home in Connecticut the weather had been dry and quite cool. This was a “classic” spring, even to people in their 20s, without heat waves, incessant air quality alerts and air conditioning running nonstop. Folks in Western New York and Northwestern...
Read MoreThe weather of this slowww spring
Is it spring? How about now? This could turn into an, “are we there yet?!” routine rather quickly if we cannot manage to move the ridge to the East and get a consistent southerly flow soon! I think we all know it was an extremely cold winter for New England and the Mid-Atlantic but here’s more evidence if you needed to be convinced. Temperature departures of that magnitude across such large swaths of the nation are incredible. It’s notable to have a single month more than a few degrees one way or the other, forget three with huge areas 6 to 8 degrees below average and...
Read More