Marcia Bonta

  • May Journal Highlights

    May Day Musings May 1. 47 degrees at dawn and overcast with a shower before breakfast. Three deer foraged in the flat area and did not flee when I set out the bird feeder. Halfway along Black Gum Trail, the first ovenbirds finally sang. Our springs are later and later; England’s are earlier and earlier–three…

  • International Migratory Bird Day

    Saturday, May 12: International Migratory Bird Day. I spring awake at 6:00 a.m., pull out my earplugs, and start counting birds–eastern phoebe, black-capped chickadee, Baltimore oriole, tufted titmouse–as I dress, my windows wide open to a medley of birdsongs and calls this humid, warm morning. Out to the yard I rush and try to separate…

  • Saving the Future

    “I’m convinced that something has to be done to keep cows out of the stream,” David Heverly told me. And so he had enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program, which is better known by its acronym CREP. A federal program authorized and funded under the current Farm Bill, it is administered by the Farm…