Snow Birds

The standard wisdom, drummed into my head as a child in Indiana, was that birds all go south for the winter. As every child knows, birds are a sign of spring. How do children know this "fact"? It's in picture books and songs, and adults repeat it until children repeat it.

But like so many "facts" about the world around us, it's wrong; and only the slightest attention is necessary to determine that it's wrong. A walk outdoors in a snowy setting on a gloomy late December day reveals at least ten species of birds easily visible to even a casual observer without binoculars. They're making their usual bird noises and flitting around in their usual bird manner, or (in the case of the Cooper's Hawk) perching attentively on branches to watch for an opportunity to pick off one of the others. The variety and number are certainly lower in winter than during migration season, but the birds are far from absent.