When nature throws CURVE BALLS

When we look at field guides, the birds are SO easy to identify. We can see every characteristic, every field mark: the heavy stripes on a female Rose-breasted Grosbeak’s head, the blotchy dark spot in the Song Sparrow’s breast, the two-tone bill of an American Tree Sparrow.

But when we’re out in nature, often, SO often, something gets in the way. Something keeps us from seeing what we really want to see. So often, so VERY often, nature throws us curve balls.

Here are just a few of those curve balls: distance, weather, poor light, movement, impediments, and contortions. How do we deal with them? Let me explain.

Let’s start with Distance. We see a distant white dot. It could be an egret. Or a Snow Goose. A gull? Or maybe a rarity here in Vermont, like a white morph Great Blue Heron or even an immature Little Blue Heron.

Or a white plastic shopping bag.

Then there’s Weather. We who love birding go birding a lot. We go birding on beautiful sunlit days when the sky is a pure blue and there’s almost no breeze and every single thing is crisp and clear, every color strong and true.

We also go birding when it’s overcast. When it’s misty. When it’s downright foggy.

We go birding when storms are coming. When it’s raining, sleeting, snowing. When it’s so cold that we have trouble