Heat wave

When I got up, an ice fog hung over the frozen creek.  I've been told that this is caused by the moist air getting chilled by the ice, not the ice subliming.  Oh well. The sun shone in a hazy sky and there was little wind. 

Bluebirds got ahead of me and were looking for the dish of food before I'd put it outside.  Fortunately they checked back later and I counted five of them.  Three kinds of woodpecker visited the suet - downy pileated and red bellied.  The yellow rumped and pine warblers chased and fought over the suet.  White throated sparrows and juncoes mostly stuck to sunflower seeds.  Carolina wrens liked the dish of crumbs and worms. 

Mama squirrel decided her insulation had failed during the cold snap and today she could finally get at leaves that had been under the snow.  I got tired watching her climb the pine with mouthful after mouthful of leaves to stuff into the nest.  Meanwhile, the short tailed squirrel ate from the dish full of hot pepper bark butter crumbs. But it didn't eat very much so maybe the pepper still worked. 

Then a new bird showed up, a ruby-crowned kinglet.  Although he didn't raise his ruby crest, one photo caught a bit of red, showing he was male.  This was only the second time I've seen one in the yard, and the first was a couple of years ago. 

An upstream neighbor took his boat out , breaking a path through the ice.  I don't know if he was the same boater that gave up before he reached first dock beyond ours. I lost count of the number of buzzards hanging around.  I assume they were on the lookout for dead fish.  Quite a few great blue herons seemed to have the same idea. Clouds thickened in the afternoon as warm air continued to flow from the South.  In the mid afternoon, I actually was outside without any coat, but it was kind of dank.