Marcia Bonta

  • February Journal Highlights, Part 2

    Last day of the Great Backyard Bird Count February 19. Seven degrees at dawn and clear but quickly warming up to eleven degrees. In the middle of my daily exercises, Bruce came into the bedroom to say, “I think I heard a bluebird singing.” Could it be? I rushed outside, binoculars in hand, listened and…

  • February Journal Highlights

    I’ve been updating my journal from the notes I take in my pocket notebook. Here are some excerpts from the first half of February. Bucks hanging out together, still wearing antlers February 3. Three degrees at dawn and absolutely clear. Winds cleaned the air and lowered the temperature throughout the moonlit night. At first, when…

  • Sy Montgomery books for kids

    I have read all three of the books by Sy Montgomery in the Houghton Mifflin “Scientists in the Field” series for kids in the 9 to 12 range. They are excellent. All have wonderful photos by Nic Bishop that accompany a fascinating text. The Snake Scientist discusses the thousands of red-sided garter snakes that hibernate…

  • The Magnificent Log-Cocks

    On bleak winter days, when the forest seems empty of life, I am often cheered by the sight and sound of pileated woodpeckers. Looking like miniature pterodactyls, they flash their black-and- white wings over a black-and-white landscape. Pileateds are also the big mouths of the woodpecker world, their demonic-sounding laughter echoing from ridgetop to ridgetop…