GBBC and snow

Today began the Great Backyard Bird Count, but an iced-over creek was not helpful.  I started counting at breakfast.For a while there was only one junco and a song sparrow.  Then everyone arrived.  2 song sparrows, 2 white throated sparrows, 2 yellow rumped warblers, the female red bellied woodpecker and the downy woodpecker pair, 2 juncos, and a cardinal pair.  There was some open water down by the dam and there I saw 2 egrets, 2 geese, 8 mallards, and in flight a great blue heron and a gull.  Clouds rolled out of the West.

I counted again in the late morning.  A titmouse tried to get seeds but the warbler kept chasing it.  4 white throats and a song sparrow joined 4 juncos to forage.  The red belly was back on the suet and the cardinal pair and a male house finch squabbled with sparrows and juncos over the seed feeder.  I saw a gull fly over several times.  The ice retreated a bit and the tide came up.  A junco and a warbler investigated the pool excavation. 

After lunch, I counted again.  This time a goldfinch, a dove, and a Carolina wren joined the others.  I also noticed a crow and a flock of blackbirds across the creek.  8 geese flew upstream, wheeled in front of us and headed back down. Shortly before 2pm the snow began.  It fell lightly but steadily for the rest of the day as birds stocked up.

The snow finally stopped after 5pm.  It coated the vegetation but not the pavement.  What had fallen on the ice was apparently absorbed and gradually the creek went from white to gray.  Cormorants commuted home under a gray sky.