Guest Author - Nancy Hertzel

It’s spring! The great thing about springtime is that you don’t have to “go birding.” No matter where you live, the birds are coming to you. Migration routes are filling up like freeways at rush hour, although you can’t see it happening because most birds migrate at night. No matter; this just makes every morning a new experience in your yard; at this time of the year, you really never know who might be in that tree out front.

In the darkness just before dawn, if you open your window or step outside, you will hear a robin begin to sing. As the eastern sky begins to lighten, other birds wake up and chime in, until, in just a few minutes, you’ve got the full “dawn chorus,” that wonderful, musical blend of thrushes, towhees, chickadees, sparrows, finches, wrens, and any others that might be there as the sun rises, opening their mouths and singing for all they’re worth. It doesn’t last long, and if you miss it, they won’t do it again until the next morning.

There is something indescribably magical and fresh and hopeful and new about that moment on a spring morning when the dew is on the grass, the sun is just rising, and the birds are all singing. If you haven’t ever been up at dawn to feel it, hear it, and experience it, you haven’t lived. But – you still have something to live for. Tomorrow morning, get up five minutes earlier and give yourself that moment.