Col Sam Smith Park was glorious on this 26 degree, partly cloudy morning.

We saw Spotted Sandpipers several times. The adult breeders are relatively brown with spots on the breast.

Species list: double-crested cormorant, red-necked grebe, Canada goose, mute swan, mallard, spotted sandpiper, killdeer, ring-billed gull, Caspian tern, common tern, mourning dove, chimney swift, rock pigeon, hairy woodpecker,  eastern kingbird,  tree swallow, rough-winged swallow, barn swallow, gray catbird, American robin, European starling, warbling vireo, yellow warbler, common yellowthroat, house sparrow, red-winged blackbird, brown-headed cowbird, common grackle, northern cardinal, American goldfinch, song sparrow.  (31 species)

Park scenes:

This morning’s group:

Some botany:

Sleeping racoon:

NATURE POETRY

A narrow Fellow in the Grass
Occasionally rides –
You may have met him? Did you not
His notice instant is –

The Grass divides as with a Comb,
A spotted Shaft is seen,
And then it closes at your Feet
And opens further on –

He likes a Boggy Acre –  
A Floor too cool for Corn –
But when a Boy and Barefoot
I more than once at Noon

Have passed I thought a Whip Lash
Unbraiding in the Sun
When stooping to secure it
It wrinkled And was gone –

Several of Nature’s People
I know, and they know me
I feel for them a transport
Of Cordiality

But never met this Fellow
Attended or alone
Without a tighter Breathing
And Zero at the Bone. – Emily Dickinson

Miles Hearn