First Shrike of the Season

We've had an extraordinary amount of rain recently which is a bit odd for this time of year. When I arrived at the park today it was obvious just how often it's been raining. But now the morning temps are cold enough to have frozen it in place overnight and the trails on the west side of the park were covered by an inch of ice. We still haven't seen any snow and the grass on the baseball fields looks like it could be June. Here I spotted a Crow wrestling with something on the ground, standing on it and picking at it. Not a great photo but this one shows that the Crow had found a discarded hot dog and bun! Crows are resourceful and will eat pretty much anything. The park was rather slow for wildlife today and some of the only other birds I saw were American Tree Sparrows. But on the north side I happened to notice a bird perched alone in the top of a tree and thought to myself "it's gotta be!" Indeed it was a Northern Shrike, the first one I've spotted this season! It didn't stay still for long and the only few pics I got were from quite a distance. But still it was ID-able. I ran into some friends shortly after this and asked if they'd seen it but they hadn't. Instead they were watching 2 Red-tailed Hawks soaring very high above the center of the park.