Birds Are the Life of the Skies
October 23, 2012
“Birds are the life of the skies, and when they fly, they reveal the thoughts of the sky.”
— D. H. Lawrence, Birds, Beasts, and Flowers
The first snow geese are starting to return to the Skagit Valley, which is their winter feeding ground. These vast animal migrations are a wonder and a mystery. What strong, inner forces urge them to leave home for another so far away? Do they understand their restlessness and the force that propels them? It’s awe-some for me to be in the presence of such instinctual behavior.
Wintering Snow Geese
January 25, 2010
Tens of thousands of snow geese winter in the Skagit Valley, leaving in March and April for Wrangel Island off the coast of Siberia where they nest and raise their young. Then by mid- or late October, they return to the Skagit Valley for another winter.
On Saturday, my husband and I took a drive to Conway and Mount Vernon, about an hour north of Seattle, in search of these snow geese. They are easy to spot, brilliant white against the muddy fields where they feed. It is simply awesome, sublime, wonderous to see thousands of these birds in one place. They honk and call, and the sound of thousands of wings flapping simultaneously is astounding. I don’t understand why this natural spectacle is not as celebrated as the Skagit Valley’s more famous tulip fields. I thought they were well worth the trip.
“Suddenly, as if detonated, the flock took wing. Thirty thousand geese lifted off the ice in front of us, wingbeats drumming the air, goose yelps gathering to a pounding, metallic yammer — the sound of steel being hammered on anvils, in caverns. The ice thrummed and sang with it. The exploded flock filled our fields of vision, a blizzard of birds.”
— William Fiennes, The Snow Geese