If you've lived in Minnesota for any length of time you'll probably agree that January and February are the toughest months to get through. In a typical winter the majority of these months have high temps of below freezing and it's pretty easy to spend all your time indoors. It's also easy to go weeks without seeing the sun. This winter has been really different from that however and the sun has been shining nearly every weekend.
Though the temperature today was cold at just 10 degrees, it is still great walking weather -especially without the snowy, icy paths like last year. The first thing of interest I spotted was near the northwest corner of the park where hundreds of European Starling decided to park and make a lot of noise. After a while one or two would dart off, tempting the others to do the same and the whole flock would move to a different tree for no apparent reason. Then it would happen all over again in another few minutes. If you ever see this many Starlings at once, make sure to listen to the noises they make. You can often hear imitations of other birds such as Hawks or Blue Jays coming from the group. Later I spotted some Downy Woodpeckers but things were generally quiet after passing the Starlings.
When going around the southeast baseball diamonds, a few Crows were scattered around not to high up in some scrubby trees. One was obviously busy with something so I was able to get closer and catch this shot showing a mouse in his beak. It's easy to overlook how resourceful Crows are. If you think about how big they are and how large in numbers they are, you gotta wonder how are all of them are surviving each day. In order to make it, they can't be too picky about what they eat.
Though the temperature today was cold at just 10 degrees, it is still great walking weather -especially without the snowy, icy paths like last year. The first thing of interest I spotted was near the northwest corner of the park where hundreds of European Starling decided to park and make a lot of noise. After a while one or two would dart off, tempting the others to do the same and the whole flock would move to a different tree for no apparent reason. Then it would happen all over again in another few minutes. If you ever see this many Starlings at once, make sure to listen to the noises they make. You can often hear imitations of other birds such as Hawks or Blue Jays coming from the group. Later I spotted some Downy Woodpeckers but things were generally quiet after passing the Starlings. 
When going around the southeast baseball diamonds, a few Crows were scattered around not to high up in some scrubby trees. One was obviously busy with something so I was able to get closer and catch this shot showing a mouse in his beak. It's easy to overlook how resourceful Crows are. If you think about how big they are and how large in numbers they are, you gotta wonder how are all of them are surviving each day. In order to make it, they can't be too picky about what they eat.
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