Brenda

Activity 3:   I saw the most unusual thing on Valentine's Day.  A hawk was in my bushes thrashing around.  I thought it was killing one of the chipmunks or squirrels or rabbits that roam my backyard.  At first I thought it had probably already done terminal damage and I couldn't stop it, but it kept on.  Finally I went outside and yelled and threw tennis balls at it - don't worry, I can't hit the side of a barn, but nothing would make it stop.  Then I saw that there were two of them.  I thought -- are they mating?   They carried on forever.  It was pretty rigorous. Then when the action stopped, I thought that one of them had killed the other one, but the upright one dragged the prostrate one out of the bushes by one foot.  The prostrate one got up and they both flew off together!  I think from what I could see with the thrashing and the bushes impeding my view was that they were Cooper's Hawks.

I voted for the Carolina wren, Brown Thrasher, Common Loon - what a magical song, so mystical, and the Cardinal.  We have three of these in our backyard, but the loon calls to me across some ethereal, Camelot-like setting and beckons me to a enter the mist to a world of imagination.