Date: 1/19/26 6:58 am From: Ted Levin <tedlevin1966...> Subject: [VTBIRD] 19 January 2026: Hurricane Hill (1,100 feet), WRJ
6:57 a.m. (twenty minutes before sunrise, which is a minute earlier than
yesterday). 16 degrees, wind west-northwest, three miles per hour, gusting
to seven. Quarter-inch of fresh snow lines limbs and boughs; flurries are
sparse, crystals are large. Floats down, barely drifts, ignores the wind
(which appears to be ignoring my side of the Hill). Overhead, gray and
sullen sky, without highlights.
Thin river fog meets atmospheric moisture. Across the White River, Dothan
Hill softens to deciduous brushstrokes, brown and threadlike, and a half
dozen white, oblong meadows. Across the Connecticut River, except for the
suggestion of Moose Mountain, the entire New Hampshire skyline is gutted.
The crown of Hurricane Hill marks the end of the world ... nothing beyond
but moisture. No Megellan, I turn around and head home.
Fresh snow, a tabula rasa. Single file fox and coyote tracks dimple the
road. A half dozen gray squirrels quit the trees—a bounding gait; sets of
tracks a foot or more apart. Larger hind footprints lead; smaller forefoot
prints trail. Toes countable. Even the tiny hairs on the sides of their
feet leave an impression.
7:02 a.m. Flock of American goldfinches exits a roadside spruce. Calling
over the meadow. En route to a feeder (maybe mine). (By the time I get
home, they're crowding the canopy of a maple; taking turns on the feeders.)
7:08 a.m. Following last week's example set by chickadees, a tufted
titmouse lustily sings in the aspens.
7:09 a.m. Lonesome crow calling in the fog. Where's everybody else?
7:10 a.m. Chickadee sings. Another calls. It's official, the day has begun
(at least for me).
Four minutes later, a pileated woodpecker over the meadow, pointed at both
ends. Heads east (again), dipping and rising and screaming. Low and dark,
interrupting the fog.
*Annals of a Tramoline:* 9:11 a.m. Looking out my office window, I glimpse
a barred owl landing on the end of a hemlock bough, bouncing up and down,
displacing snow. Gray-brown wing flicks wings like a boy waving his arms to
balance. In the midst of balancing, the owl stares straight down. Studies
the mysteries. Sufficiently motivated, it plunges, head and talons aligned.
Between the first raised bed and the berry patch, a puff of snow rises
where the owl hits the ground—owl motionless. Freeze frame—for a few
moments. Then, flies east into the hemlocks, carrying only hunger.
