Weather Streak and Name that Bird

I am beginning to think my blog should have some sort of weather term in the title since I end up talking about the weather 9 times out of 10. The thing is, my job is so dependent on the weather that my days go one way or the other depending on what it looks like outside. This time of the year, when we usher thousands of children a month through this building and on our trails, weather is critical. We have been extremely lucky these past few weeks. Beautiful weather and so the kids coming through here and going on hikes are happy. The animals are out more in this weather too, so the kids get to see more. Green frogs, bullfrogs, geese, deer with fawn, turtles, muskrat, all kinds of nesting birds.

Animals aren't just busy at Tanglewood, they are busy elsewhere too. Including in people's backyards. Consequently, this is also the time of year Tanglewood gets phone calls about what to do with abandonded baby animals (we can't really help, we have to refer them to licensed rehabilitators), and questions about bird identification. I love the calls where people ask for someone that knows about birds to talk to. Often it is me that takes the calls, then the person on the other end proceeds to try and imitate a bird they have been hearing in their backyard. "It's kind of like a cheep, cheep, creak, chitter, coo... Can you tell me what it is?" Usually I can't tell them. But sometimes I can. Then there are the visual IDs, "It is big, like a hawk, but has red on its head, blue wings and a brown tail...I think maybe it is going to try and kill my cat..." Whaaah? I had a call the other day from someone wanting me to ID a tree over the phone. "I don't think it is from this country, maybe China, has red, sticky, sweet things with no seeds..." I couldn't ID the tree, although these questions intrigue me enough to spend time trying to figure out the mystery long after I get off the phone with people. One of my questions to myself after I got off the phone this time was, how did he know the red, sticky things were SWEET? :-) People are funny and they make my job much more interesting.