SET 'EM UP, JOE…

A recent snow squall, which for almost an hour poured in like a minor blizzard, apparently generated a powerful thirst among the local avian population. One minute the ice-shelf across from the cottage was empty, the next two-dozen or so birds were lined up at the ice’s edge, tippling forward and back, drinking like they hadn’t seen a drop of water in weeks. They looked for all the world like a gaggle of parched cowboys all bellied up to a saloon bar, at the end of a long and dusty cattle drive. The group was constantly changing. Birds few in from the thickets along the bank, found a space in the lineup, began imbibing. Others, their sudden thirst apparently quenched, flew back into the brush. At one point I counted nearly fifty birds strung out along this ice shelf. This is really one of those shots you need to click and enlarge…and even then, you may not be able to identify the participants. Most of the birds in the photo are robins, along with a few starlings. The bird near the center, the one sort of isolated and hunkered down, is a flicker. That flicker remained in that same spot, drinking a few sips at a time, for twenty minutes, through who knows how many shift changes of robins and other species. However, at one point, before the flicker appeared on scene, every bird drinking off the ice’s edge—more than thirty of ‘em—were robins. The feathered drinkers shuffled and sipped for half an hour. Then, lounge time over, they departed as quickly as they’d arrived. Snow continued to fall, the river slipped silently along, and the ice shelf was again empty.