Birds of a feather flock together!

Bald Eagle, Black Bear, Snapping Turtle and Grey Wolf all sit down to look and listen for birds.

Well it sure didn’t feel like Spring when everyone arrived at the hall!  As we worked on making our bird scopes and learned about bird facts from our cards during circle time we all wondered if we would see or hear as many birds as we did last week. 

Bundled up with bird scopes in hand the Turtle Ornithologists were off to see if our feathered friends would make an appearance. How did your scopes work in our scavenger hunt before leaving for the trail?  Did you find all the hidden birds?  After some trial run practice it was time to hit the trails and see if our scopes could help us find the real thing!

What birds did you hear as we walked down the trail to Cedar Castle?  Did you remember how many birds songs were recorded on the Merlin Bird app?  Even when we couldn’t see them we certainly could hear them!  

Meet you in Chickadee Circle!  Quietly listening and looking. Birds everywhere. While standing at Swan Lookout did you notice the Canada Goose swimming alone?  In the library Grey Squirrel read “The Lonely Goose” and gave us a possible answer to our question.  What happened to the Goose’s mate in the story?  Although the story ended happily, animals dying is all part of nature. 

In the afternoon when we were exploring for signs of birds we found some feathers on the ground, in particular some yellow tail feathers of a flicker.  How did it make you feel to see the goose alone in Mill Pond and the feathers on the ground on Butterfly Hill?  What do you think happened to the goose’s mate and to the flicker?  Geese mate for life.  Do you know other birds that do the same?

During our trail walks and wanders did you notice any changes to our environment from last week?  Hawk and Blue Jay found lots of branches on the ground around Cedar Castle and with Dragonfly’s help constructed a shelter and a giant nest. Do you think any animals will use them over the week? How will we tell?

On our travels over to Cedar Hideaway there were more opportunities for shelter building and a chance to check out the water. How did it look?  How fast was the current?  What did you do to test the speed of the moving water?

Although our day was spent observing and studying our feathered friends, those weren’t the only creatures we were interacting with.  Pin Cherry kept an eye on some Turtle friends helping out a damaged tree friend.  Did your homemade bird scope help you to focus before trying the real binoculars? Blue Jay and Leopard Frog worked together to check on their tree friends, left some cobs for the animals and secured their tree friends with rocks.  One even had TREE etched on it’s surface.  Nice work Leopard Frog!  If only trees could read!

Some Turtles left pinecone gifts at their tree friends. Leopard Frog noticed that a broken stick was a home for a larva. Black Bear even found a wooly bear caterpillar which he brought back to his tree friend. Do you remember what the legend says about the colours of a Wooly Bear?  

In the story “When We Are Kind” we learned that it is not only important to be kind to nature but to also work together, be respectful to ourselves and to our friends.  “When we are kind we  remember that we are all related. “ What did you do to be kind today?