I notice the sun setting in its farthest point west from my kitchen now. It is so far in the corner that it is almost out of view from the window. In December? It sets directly in front of my kitchen faucet. On the other side of the house, there is a point now where the sun shines directly onto my face in the morning. A visual alarm that only happens for a few days in June.

Most of my adult life I did not pay much attention to where the sun was in the sky in any given month. When we are young, summer begins when school is out. But slowly, as I began to watch and pay attention to things like bird migrations and flowers blooming, it became impossible to not notice things like the stars, and the moon. And the role the sun plays in all of this.

The way shadows change not only in the yard, but also maybe where the sun is on our commutes, or where it shines through the main windows of the house.

Since I will be volunteering again this Sunday morning with birds, I will have the special opportunity to be awake for when the actual solstice begins at 4:24am (in Eastern time, Northern Hemisphere). And additionally when the sun sets roughly 15 hours later.

May you find your own small ritual to acknowledge the solstice, whether its a walk in nature, lighting a candle or simply watching the sun set.

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Come see.

I don’t even remember why I stepped outside on this particular morning. I needed to step away from the computer most likely. And the birds were kindly reminding me that the tray of sunflower seeds was empty. The water rock constantly needs filling too.

As I often do, I was scanning the meadow for a monarch, or a swallowtail. They have got to be here. A skipper was spotted. A mud dauber wasp. But not a butterfly anywhere. A chatty Northern house wren caught my eye. They can sing with a mouthful of food. I found that entertaining. I heard an indigo bunting. Which was a delight.

But I was looking for monarchs. I have not seen one since May 18th. This is a long spell for me to go without them. The milkweed plants in the meadows are bursting. The bright orange butterfly weed in the front meadow and the common milkweed in the back meadow are hitting their peak right about now. But where are they? I kept on walking.

The dry spell of late is beginning to hold double meaning. No rain, and an absence of butterflies. And then I stopped. Right there, I shared a moment with the tree swallow whose nest box sits in the meadow, still feeding its brood just like the wren on the far side of the meadow. And that’s when the flash of orange whizzed by me. Can it be what I hope it is?

But something was off. It flew differently, and I asked myself, “What was THAT?”

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This wrong turn at a Y in the path during a pre-dawn bird banding shift where I volunteer led me to two birds.

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That observation stuck with me, and resurfaced the next day when I was watching the meadow in our backyard. I see it all the time. But I realized I never fully appreciate it.

Whether it’s a forest, or a meadow, long-term observation reveals the slow but profound changes in ecosystems. The butterflies visiting my yard tomorrow depend on years of growth that we may forget to notice. The same is true of this podcast. Every walk, observation, and recording has quietly accumulated beneath the surface, becoming the ideas for whatever comes next. Personal growth, like ecological development, takes time and persistence. And apparently, getting lost once and while helps too.

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The woods are quiet and beautiful first thing in the morning…

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And in that meadow, again, this month another brief moment lent itself to wonder. Fireflies, or lightning bugs, those summer sweetheart beetles, are the quintessential sight of a summer evening. This May, I searched for them every night at the end of my evening walk. Each walk ended with me squinting toward the dark tree line. “Are they there? How about over there?” Questions swirled while my eyes scanned. I had been waiting and waiting and they finally appeared on May 26. Just in one spot in the yard, where the meadow is. Where the conditions are just right for them.

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At the end of my walk they appeared. A walk I took every night. I did not just go outside, take a look, and go back inside. There’s a difference. As the days went on, they ventured out into other areas. I can see them from the kitchen window now.

But my expectations to see other things that I also knew would be here, have been met with a drastically different outcome.

I expected a rose-breasted grosbeak and the tuxedo-wearing Eastern kingbird. Those two long-distance migratory songbirds were quite a regular appearance in the yard last summer, so I expected them again this year. A brief sighting that lasted as long as the time it took to drive down the driveway. That was all I had so far, a white tipped tail that flew up into the hawthorn grove.

But they are not here. They are phantoms. Not so much imaginary. But more so, expected, but unseen.

I can’t sugarcoat this: things are different in the yard this month. Because things that I expected to notice, (and was frankly waiting on) have not shown up.

When I walked around the yard yesterday and came face to face with the amount of damage the deer had done, all I could hear was the wren and the wood thrush in the background. Were it not for that song? I don’t know…it would have been much easier to run indoors and shut out my broken flowers. But I didn’t. The birds that were here wrapped the meadow in sound anyway.

The fireflies would have been in the meadow whether I was looking for them or not. As for the birds? The best moments are the ones that come in unannounced. Not unlike the best lightning storms are the ones that light up the evening sky when the forecasters didn’t see it coming.

So am I expecting to see things and they are not showing? While when I was oblivious and just being, they were all there? Or is it something more? Last year, and the year before that, my camera roll was filled with photos of rose-breasted grosbeaks and Eastern kingbirds.

But what if instead…the yard is actually fine and it's just that expectation narrows the focus? I looked so hard for the rose-breasted grosbeak that I almost missed the wood thrush singing through the meadow.

Has my own expectation replaced wonder? Perhaps when I spotted those birds in years past they just happened to be present because I was there in the moment. Not waiting for the moment like I am now.

What do we do when what we expect doesn’t show up?

We listen for the wood thrush apparently.

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Not because it is at a mall. But because at home, I have that same flower. And it is nowhere near that level of bloom. My echinacea blooms are still in a tight cluster, not even looking to bloom for at least a week or so. I double checked when I got home. Yep. They are still in that phase. A tight whorl. Just a cluster of green.

Why is this? This blooming flower at the mall is barely eight miles away. If that. I have the species of flower at home. But mine is…well, green.

The flower that sits in front of Nordstrom Rack has something my plants lack. Heat from the pavement, and heat off the building. Additionally, it is growing in what is known as the hell strip. A small area of “greenspace” that sits between a street and sidewalk. Usually an area no wider than a beach towel in most cases. This little microclimate puts this plant about two weeks ahead of me in the bloom schedule.

Here’s what else: Your coneflower is doing something the mall flower maybe did inside of a plastic tub. In a greenhouse... Yours? It's building roots first. Going down, before going up.

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The flower in my yard is just a star shaped cluster of furry pointed green leaves. It is about knee high though. A sea of green and purple spiderwort plants sit around the flower-to-be. The echinacea is just tuning its instrument right now while the bees dance around the spiderwort with their little orange pollen clusters like pantaloons.

Our yard sits at the bottom of a small hill flanked on one side by woods. So it is naturally colder. Even my trees leaf out later than the neighboring town. It is even possible that rainfall amounts have differed as well. Seven miles doesn’t seem like much, but it is enough to alter bloom time.

So if you're thinking your yard is behind the curve. Don't worry. It is probably ticking away at its own schedule.

Dinner eventually made it to the table that night. And your coneflowers will eventually make it too. And when they do, it’s magic!

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Wednesdays are a podcast day normally for me. But this week, life is shifting, I now have a 9th grader (what?) and instead of scrambling to make one where my heart wasn’t in it, I decided not to record.

I have showed up every single week since March, and every single week before that since October. But this week, I needed that pause. I needed to look at the stars (ahem, planets). And take a moment. A moment to look at something like these flowers that just opened up this week.

If watching native plants grow over the past 10 years has taught me anything, it’s that growth doesn't happen on a schedule we can control. Plants that did amazing last summer are struggling. A trifecta of weather : summer drought | bitter winter | spring drought. Leaves are turning yellow that shouldn’t. Birds I enjoyed all last summer using my yard as a home base are not here. Even the amount of hummingbirds seems less. Some of my butterfly weed is even struggling. (The one pictured above is a superstar.)

Episode 32 will come when it comes.

For now, I hope you have had a chance to soak up the start of summer. The sweet scents that circulate. Something between sunscreen, honeysuckle, and sweet tea. And thank you, subscribers for sticking around. I am thankful you are all here!!! Each and every one of you!

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This is a continuation from a piece I published earlier, Birding Beat Pickleball in a Recent Match Play and promised a follow-up. So here it is!

There is a 1-800 number and a website stamped on a metal band which is around a small bone.

Not a hotline. Not a tip line. A research line. One that connects a single recovered band—maybe found in a field, maybe at the base of a tree, maybe in your front yard on a cold January morning—to a scientist who has been waiting for a notification like that one. These are the rare occasions. Most band records are recorded when the bird is encountered at a banding station, where the information of recapture come through data pingbacks, not backyard discoveries.

*All birds in this article are handled with proper permits and training.*

It was January 2019. Bright, cold, low sun slanting across the short brown grass. My family was out in the yard, which is a normal enough thing for us, and my husband spotted something small and shiny in the grass. Not much bigger than a pea, but catching the light just right.

It was a band. A bird band. Still attached to a leg bone. A small pile of bones and feathers nearby told the rest of the story—or at least enough of it.

We had found an owl pellet. A larger owl—most likely a Great Horned—had preyed on a smaller bird, consumed it, and later regurgitated the indigestible parts in a compact mass called a pellet. That pellet landed in our front yard. And with it, the band.

Still attached to the leg bone of the bird that had once worn it. I live in a small town and it was banded by someone we knew. Taken, almost certainly, by a great horned owl.

What Is Bird Banding, Exactly?

Licensed scientists attach small, numbered metal bands to songbirds, owls, hawks, falcons, shorebirds. Even hummingbirds. Approximately 1,200 banding stations operate across North America.

Since 1904, about 60 million birds have been banded in North America. And some of those…recovered and reported—by researchers, hunters, hikers, photographers and sometimes by people standing in their front yard like me. That data is used in multiple ways to monitor avian population dynamics. That tiny band is a thread connecting individual birds to a much larger story.

The Recovery

We reported our find to the United States Geological Survey (USGS) via the website on the band. The band had been placed by Wild Bird Research Group, Inc. (WBRG), a nearby non-profit where both my husband and I would later become deeply invested, and still are today. (I woke at 4:15am this morning to be at songbird banding by 5:25am)

We received a Certificate of Appreciation—which is what happens when you report a band to the Bird Banding Laboratory at reportband.gov. The original banding date, location, and species come back to you. Your observation becomes part of the official record. It was in fact, an Eastern screech owl, who we allowed our then eight-year-old daughter to receive the certificate.

The bands are placed by professionals. But the recoveries often come from regular people who happen to look down at the right moment. Or photograph with extreme detail!

I have since held different band sizes in my own hand—at a WBRG banding station. The size difference between a saw-whet owl band and a great horned owl band is startling. An American goldfinch? Tiny. One is delicate, almost dainty. The other is substantial in a way that makes you understand, physically, what kind of bird wears it. Holding that band, I thought about the screech owl in my yard. About the great horned that likely took it. About how the whole story was always about more than one bird. Later on, I would find an American goldfinch in my yard, sadly deceased, and went on to report that one as well.

Site Fidelity: That Bird Might Not Be a Stranger

Here is the part of banding science that I find most astonishing. Birds return.

Not just to the same continent. Not just to the same state. To the same patch. The same shrubby reforestation corridor. The same backyard. The same farm field. I have heard that some birds like barn swallows will return to the same nest, and fix it up. Tree swallows…same thing, same nesting site within about 300 feet.

This is called site fidelity, and it is one of the most remarkable things that long-term banding data reveals. Wild Bird Research Group, Inc. has hard data on individual birds—common yellowthroats, to name one species—recaptured at Fiddler’s Creek Preserve in New Jersey two, even three summers in a row. The same individual bird, returning to the same several-acre patch of preserved land to breed. Year after year. I find that fascinating. Today, at banding we encountered a field sparrow that was originally banded by them in 2023, and it returned again this morning. Making the bird over five years old!

Think about it. A bird, a common yellowthroat, that weighs less than half an ounce. That has navigated a continent. That has survived a winter somewhere south of here, predators and weather and habitat loss along the way. And it comes back. Not just to New Jersey. To this same field. This shrubby edge. This exact place. Twice! I am hoping to see him again this summer.

Now think about your yard.

The bird at your feeder this June might be the same bird that was there last June. The owl you hear at dusk might have a territory that includes your property year after year. The warbler moving through your garden in May might be making a stop it has made before, on a route it knows.

You may already be part of someone’s migration story. You just don’t have the data yet.

This is why habitat matters so personally—and why the banding program is about so much more than individual recoveries. When Fiddler’s Creek Preserve stays intact through land preservation and stewardship, that Common yellowthroat has somewhere to return to.

Without that land preservation? That bird, and many others, is at a loss.

When the field becomes a parking lot or a subdivision—the bird that arrives the following spring finds nothing. The lake house it booked is gone. It doesn’t get a refund. It just has to keep moving, or doesn’t.

The data that banding produces is what lets us tell the difference between a place that’s working and a place that’s failing. It is, at its core, a story about fidelity—between birds and land—and what happens when that bond is honored or broken.

From Observer to Participant

Birding becomes something more when the familiar birds at your local spot might be carrying secrets about journeys you never imagined. And the places you bird—your yard, your local preserve, the scrubby edge of a field you’ve walked a hundred times—start to look different when you understand that birds are not interchangeable visitors. They are individuals. Returning individuals. With histories.

The Band on My Nightstand

So what happened to the band from that January morning?

A necklace. The band that was on the leg of an Eastern Screech Owl—banded by WBRG, recovered in my front yard, reported to the USGS—is now one of my favorite pieces of jewelry. It carries the full weight of that story: a cold bright morning, a glint in the grass, a certificate of appreciation, and the fact that for one brief moment, our front yard was part of something much larger than us.

The Great Horned Owl that took that Screech was never identified. Never banded. Never seen. But it left behind exactly enough evidence to send me down a path I am still walking. Even if it means waking up at 4am, or heading into the woods at 10pm to look for owls in October. I am grateful to be a part of the non-profit organization that does this research.

I was pleased to spot some post-flowering bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis) on the trail. It seemed so out of place. Like it fell out of a greenhouse and landed on the forest floor. I spotted a few more familiar plants along the way. Most were done flowering now. But a few sturdy foxglove beardtongue flowers found themselves enough sunlight to grow, despite the filled-in canopy.

What happened next was completely unexpected…

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Standing quietly beneath the trees, I found myself face-to-face with a moment I had hoped for days earlier and failed to come across.

There was just one problem…

In this week’s episode, I share a story about timing, attention, and the strange way nature seems to deliver exactly what we’re looking for when we’re least prepared for it.

There is a particular crevice in that snag—a small crack in the cedar, high enough that I can see it clearly from the kitchen window—where he wedges birdseed from the feeder. He’ll arrive with a sunf…

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This essay is a continuation from Wednesday’s post, as promised when I happened upon a darling duo of piping plovers. Originally, the Sunday essay only going to be a follow-up on the piping plover podcast with a few more photos from the beach. And I was going to tell you the story of the band report I submitted of my sighting. Somehow, a weekend hike dropped this story into my lap, and here we are. A photo essay about a bird that weighs as much as two nickles.

I spent hours at Sandy Hook trying to photograph a common yellowthroat and came home with a story about a piping plover. It’s funny how these things work out. I was at sea level on Monday searching for a tiny warbler with a bright yellow chest and a black mask. And 5 days later on Saturday? I photographed one at the highest point in my county. Finally.

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Here’s how it happened:

With the sun on our faces and the wind in the woods swirling around the scent of honeysuckle, we climbed. My daughter had appointed herself trailmaster.

This proved both helpful and hazardous because while the trail was extremely narrow with a 310 foot elevation gain, it was nice to have someone to follow. However, the single track was also missing some markers. We found ourselves slightly off course perhaps? Did I miss a marker? Or did we both?

I lost my balance while negotiating a large fallen tree when my camera backpack shifted. Gravity won that argument. My right foot landed in a tangled jungle of multiflora rose thorns, honeysuckle vine and deep leaf litter up to my knee. Thankfully, only my dignity was injured. And some nice people came along and boosted me back up.

Once I gathered my footing, I found myself in a completely different landscape as we finally made it back to a proper trail. Instead of standing at sea level along the Jersey Shore, I was climbing toward one of the highest points in the county. The air tasted more and more like summer.

The summit promised an indigo bunting. I knew he would be there. The habitat was exactly what they love. Meadows flanked by mature forest. And I had seen them here in years’ past. With the Delaware River quiet below, I scanned the meadow as a flurry of swallows, like little flying cigars, swooped overhead. It was a brisk day, windy, but warm sun. Warbling vireos could be heard downhill at the edge of the vast field.

Ooooh! A blue flash dropped into the meadow. I walked downhill slightly to follow his landing. My eyes scanning for a possible resurface. He did not oblige. I waited. My heart rate was still coming down from the climb.

The wind pummeled the hillside. A tall stand of white pines over 100 feet tall behind me moved in way that didn’t seem natural, yet they handled the incessant gust. (The pines, I later learned, were planted in the 1940s and are a prominent feature of the summit.) Then, a noise I didn’t recognize was trilling above my head. Curious, I wanted to see…I shifted my glance away from the meadow and looked up. And in the black locust tree…he was just there. Willing, and available. And adorable.

He was perched above my head while I was trying to zero in on an indigo bunting. An indigo bunting led me to the moment. The exact same way a phantom common yellowthroat led to a piping plover 5 days ago.

Sometimes the things we’re looking for arrive on their own schedule.

Twenty minutes later the blue did pop out. And my birding adventure that I talked about in Episode 30 was lived. Again. At the Ted Stiles Preserve on top of Baldpate Mountain.

The Banded Piping Plover (The Backstory)

Here is the email I received back from the US Fish & Wildlife, after I reported the band sighting from last Monday. I can’t say 100% it’s the same bird because one band was possibly obscured. Still, I am grateful to hear back from them. And I finally understand what all the fuss is about. That is one seriously adorable little shorebird.

I too, wish this and many other piping plovers much success!

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At the end of Episode 30, I talked about the birds in my own yard at the end of the day. Here’s what I came home to after my day in Sandy Hook. A fearless chickadee, with a very preferred taste.

If you are looking for something in your own life right now, I hope you find it. It may just come about when you least expect it. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one!

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There are some episodes I plan carefully.

And then there are some that quietly assemble themselves around you while you’re busy looking for something else entirely.

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This week’s episode began with a common yellowthroat we could hear everywhere but could barely photograph. It unfolded across damp sand, low beach brush, cargo ships disappearing into the horizon, and tiny movements almost invisible against the shoreline.

It became a story about the small things we nearly walk past. And somewhere in the middle of it all, a tiny bird carrying more weight than its size should allow stepped briefly into view.

If you listen, stay through the ending. The final scene back at our home somehow tied the entire story together in a way I never could have planned. In Sunday’s essay I will continue the story. There will be more of what I learned while walking the beach in jeans and boots on the first “unofficial” day of summer.

This may be my favorite episode I’ve made yet.

I also experimented more with the sound design and music in this one, and I think it helped capture the feeling of the day exactly as it unfolded: gray skies, drizzle, ocean air, and those strange moments where nature suddenly rearranges your entire afternoon. And then the sun comes out after 3 days of being gone.

Thank you for being here…I can't wait to hear what you think of this one.

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If you want to learn more about protecting piping plovers and other nesting shorebirds in New Jersey, visit the Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey at http://conservewildlifenj.org. Additionally, please visit NJ Fish &Wildlife at https://dep.nj.gov/njfw/conservation/beach-nesting-birds/ for more information.

In this episode I mention Episode 12. You can find it here.

Common Yellowthroat Sound Recording provided by:

Citation

William Whitehead, XC720362. Accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/720362.

License

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0

My area is in desperate need of rain, though. Last summer it barely rained, and the streams and ponds were still looking sparse 5 days ago. So the rain was welcome, despite the numerous cancellations it caused.

I could still have a party of sorts this weekend…it is the 9 year anniversary of our rain garden. We opted to plant a rain garden in 2017. In part to alleviate a wet basement, and a soggy wet spot in the lawn. Little did I know, it would become one of the best decisions we’ve ever made for our home. It also sparked the idea of photographing and writing about my yard after someone saw the rain garden and was very interested in seeing what was there before the plants and shrubs were put in. A tree swallow gave me the first nudge to start a blog. The before and after sequence from the rain garden was what put my writing into peoples’ inboxes.

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Every day, I pull into the driveway and I find myself driving slow. Not because I have to, but because I don’t want to miss anything. A bloom that wasn’t there yesterday. A butterfly on the swamp milkweed. Once, memorably, a blue grosbeak landed in the garden, so brilliantly blue against the green. That was a day.

Or the night in April we came home and had to stop the car. There was a toad the size of a bagel in the middle of the driveway right in front of the rain garden.

This spring? A brood of Eastern bluebirds is being raised in the nest box. She is feeding them constantly it seems.

For nine years I have watched this garden handle whatever weather gets thrown at it. Deluge or drought. Record heat and record cold. Hail and even an earthquake.

The name “rain garden” implies the whole thing depends on water. So what happens during an exceptionally dry summer? (Hi, 2025 we remember you.) Does it all shrivel up and die? It does nothing of the sort.

It keeps going, it keeps blooming. It digs deeper.

It is easily the hardest working 250+ square feet on my property.

The plants chosen for a rain garden are specifically selected to handle both extremes. They need to tolerate periods of standing water after a storm and periods of drought when it hasn’t rained for weeks. This is non-negotiable for a rain garden to actually work. The plants (shrubs and trees too) that thrive in this role tend to be deep-rooted native perennials. Their root systems are extensive enough to seek out moisture well below the surface, which makes them surprisingly drought-resilient.

It can go weeks without rain in July and August. The plants are built for it. The only time I have ever “watered” the rain garden was last summer. We had a new willow oak planted on the outer edge of the garden, and in that drought of 2025, we watered it then.

The plants have found their rhythms. The Virginia bluebells get going in May, then the blue flag irises bloom and fade. The milkweed rises tall and the monarchs find it every August. The berries start to turn colors in October. The cedars hold their color through February when everything else is dormant. There is no month where nothing is happening.

The garden handles feast or famine and so do we, so does a weekend, so do 3 pints of tomatoes. They will get used. A rain garden grows whether it rains or not. It can handle it. There’s a lot to be said for that.

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This plant was the Bradley Cooper of my garden. Easy on the eyes and simple, boy-next-door charm. From late May to nearly July, it was a pale ballet-pink flower, slightly polka-dotted. Like sun-kissed freckles, plant style. Reaching only about knee high by mid-June, it was never asking for much in the garden. Not super showy, but when looked at closely, the bloom, shaped like an exploding firework, was always worthy of a photo or two. Or twenty.

Was. Somewhere…between 2023 and today, my little patch of Monarda bradburiana just disappeared.

The resident vole family has not since responded to my inquiries.

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What changes when we stop seeing nature as decoration,
and start seeing it as life cycles?

It was a normal Monday. Slightly rushed, a moment where coffee was required. And for whatever reason I put on my small monarch butterfly earrings. No particular reason. They were accessible, and go with everything.

Perhaps my Sunday essay on phenology was still in the back of mind.

And then. With no warning. No schedule on the Google calendar. No notice. There she was. A black shadow too small to be a bird and yet too big to be a bee. I ran outside and have never been so thankful for the function on my phone to double tap the power button. I was already filming my feet before I was filming my subject.

A monarch butterfly had just arrived. At Flutter By Meadows. And she found what she needed: milkweed.

And I found the topic for my next episode. That plant IS FOR YOU, monarch. It’s not for me.

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Monarchs begin their lives as small eggs, often overlooked on the underside of milkweed leaves. Once they hatch, they enter the caterpillar stage, which is marked by voracious eating and growth. They then go through 5 “instars” where they shed their skin before forming a chrysalis. Once inside the chrysalis, the caterpillar undergoes a complete metamorphosis. Within about 2 weeks it emerges as an adult butterfly.

Monarch caterpillars exclusively feed on milkweed, making it essential for their survival. Without this host plant, they cannot survive. Adult monarchs can nectar on a variety of plants, like bee balm, New York Ironweed, Joe-Pye weed and New England asters. But the same is not true for the little caterpillars.

Here’s the video I took when I spotted her:

Want to dig in a little more to caterpillar gardening? You can find This Tree Grows Catrerpillars here.

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The persistence of the heatwave is as continuous as a nasty wasp sting.
This week, no amount of breeze was enough to suffocate it.
Week of Aug 1-7, 2024 Flutter By Meadows Journal Entry.

On May 11, 2021, I spotted a monarch butterfly mid-round on a golf course. Slightly shocked. Completely giddy. It felt too early in the season to be real. But I remember it.

Fast forward five years to May 12, 2026. Same course. Same golf fundraiser. But a different foursome. The fourth player in my group had scratched last minute, like a horse pulling out of the 2026 Kentucky Derby at the starting gate. But unlike the Derby, a new face was there to fill in.

Turns out? It wasn’t a new face at all to me.

I knew him from childhood. Though I’ll admit, I briefly confused him with his brother (same first initial, different person entirely). And somewhere in untangling that, and noticing my alma mater (and his) on his embroidered belt, I discovered we hadn’t just grown up in the same town and walked the same high school hallways. We also sat in the same university lecture halls. He was just two years behind me at college. And, apparently those two years were enough to keep two people invisible to each other for decades. Until a golf course in May made other plans.

And then, somewhere between the first hole and the eighteenth, the world got smaller still. A monarch butterfly. Again. Same course. Same month. Five years later almost to the day. Some things return right on schedule. Others remember you before you remember them. And that moment was enough to make me sit down and write this essay.

I have not spotted that Eastern kingbird yet this season that I have been hoping for. But according to the time stamp on the below photo, there is time still…which is what this whole essay revolves around. Not about birds. Which is usually what I lean towards. Always. But instead about how people and places and moments, keep circling back. Patterns, connections, timing, and such. Turns out we are not too different from the patterns in nature that repeat themselves in cyclical patterns.

This week in the garden:

The Eastern red columbine is slowly starting to droop like a theater curtain that has seen one too many shows. Its time is coming to a close in the garden.

A charm of house finches appeared on the patio table, fully fledged, but still seeking the safety of their siblings as they flew around like they were still in the nest: on top of one another.

Birds are flying in and out of nest boxes. Their beaks usually full with green caterpillars and yellow slimy things. There are multiple mouths to feed. The squirrels have descended from their treetop safety to dine on maple samaras covering the ground like confetti. And the 2 Bambis I saw on someone’s lawn a few houses down could not even walk yet.

The trees thirst for rain even though they probably wouldn't admit it, if you asked. They stand tall and don’t even ask for a pardon. The rainfall in my state (and my county) in 2025 was the lowest it has been since 2001.

Yet, the subtle signs of summer are making their way through. I may have heard an indigo bunting today. The common milkweed is higher than my knees. And I did have my first monarch butterfly sighting last week…but it was not at home. But as much as I would like to claim the 1st sighting at my place, this one has somewhat even more significance. Because of the other connections that came with it. (As mentioned above.) My first monarch sighting in 2025 at home was June 11th.

At some point between 2021 and 2026, I am not sure how or where, but I stumbled upon the word “phenology”. Loosely translated, it is in essence the science of appearance.

The word was coined around 1849—by the Belgian botanist Charles François Antoine Morren. Later, I read the story of billy barr in Colorado. He took to “living off grid” before that was even a thing, and for over fifty years has kept detailed logs of things like snowfall, animal migrations and temperature. While living in a tiny shack, keeping his feet near the oven just to stay warm. Interestingly, he was born only a few miles from where I live….in Trenton, New Jersey.

This science I find fascinating. Not only is it a practice (not unlike birding) that you can do in your own yard, but you can do it year round. It is not just a warm weather task. First frost. Snowfall amounts.

You can keep a phenology wheel. You can keep a perpetual nature journal.

You can even become an official observer and log your sightings in the link above. For now, I am keeping an eye out for that first monarch to come on by my yard. But maybe I will see a viceroy butterfly instead? Only time will tell me the answer to that.

I have been seeing the common nighthawks at dusk. I saw them in the spring a few years ago and did not know what they were, my bird guide did. Seeing them now? It is just like seeing that holiday on the calendar. I know it's coming. I keep looking for them.

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Then, one random Saturday morning, when I wasn’t even looking for it, I saw it. Just beyond the ferns, under those tiny red candelabra flowers, a hummingbird was darting in and out of the blooms.

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In this episode, I’m thinking about what it means to love a garden that keeps secrets from you. The snag in the front yard that a woodpecker has finally claimed. The foxglove beardtongue that bloomed in September when it had no business doing so. The milkweed that planted itself. Just like the spicebush and the elberberry. The butterflies that always make me late for meetings because I just love watching them. None of these moments were scheduled. None of them announced themselves.

They just happened. To someone who was paying attention.

I think the reason I share so many stories from my garden is because it keeps secrets from me.

But when I am surprised, I don’t run to a bolt hole. I run to my laptop and start writing about what I saw.

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The story that unfolds, is a true tale. It’s me and a tree swallow, on an afternoon in May. A bird that sparked my whole entire writing journey in the first place.

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You may recall that I found a white feather back in March clinging to a branch. I talked about the snowy tale in Episode 20. I decided to hold onto it, because perhaps my favorite bird would go looking for that kind of thing when nest building season came along in the springtime?

I promised myself I would go out in the meadow, carried entirely by the whimsy that I could offer them a little something. These birds have gifted me with so much, that other than having nest boxes for them when they return here from their wintering grounds, I thought (as silly as it sounds) why not give them a little something too?

I had no experience in doing this, other than the knowledge that their preference of lining their nest with white feathers is about as certain as their madly impressive flying skills. It was this picture (below), and many snippets that I would later read about them, that I learned about their fondness for white feathers.

But as much as I hoped for my March tale to come true, I wondered about the tree swallows…

Would they even see it? Would they even want it, if they did not find it themselves? Would I miss the window, where their nest was already finished? I knew no answers, other than the promise I kept with myself back in March.

Over the last month, I have been watching the comings and goings of what birds are occupying which nest boxes around my home. But this particular box, I knew the least about. Most likely because it is an area where I do not walk frequently. I knew the Eastern bluebirds were in the rain garden, the chickadees were by the fire pit side of the meadow, and the Northern house wren found the box by the well head. But this box? It’s off in the side yard where I don’t often walk, and I can’t spy on it from the kitchen window.

With an open afternoon, I found time to weed the garden outside the kitchen window, but I had to go dump the weeds in our compost once my bucket was full. This nest box is on the way to the compost. So when I saw that diminutive turquoise head with a white chin and chest poking out of the box…I said, this is my chance with the feather. I was hoping the predicted thunderstorms would cancel my weeding, but instead, this would be the perfect interruption. The weeds will be still here tomorrow. This moment was now and I needed to answer the voice on Episode 20. Me.

So, on May 10th, I ditched my weeding gloves, walked inside to the fireplace mantle to grab the feather (including two others that I happened to hold on to) and walked back outside. Did I feel a little silly? Yes. Did I think this would actually work? No. Did I have any idea if this was even a thing? No. The only prelude I had was last year, I was walking to get the mail, and I saw two tree swallows above the driveway participate in some kind of game. There was a feather involved, a bit of flying technique that even The Blue Angels (US Navy) would find impressive, and I was amazed. Like watching dolphins play with bubbles.

I grabbed my phone and a selfie stick along with the feathers and headed outside. What was about to happen, I am still not exactly sure how to wrap my writer's brain around. And my weeding gloves got left on the deck. In a hurry.

Once I figured out that the stance of the Statue of Liberty was not the way to go, the bird took the feather. Not in a few minutes. It was like the wind. I did not have time to process the event. By the time the feather was inside the nest box, my husband said the look on my face was that of “Um, I, wait, um, this, just, like, it was, gone! She took the feather.” It was that amazing. I needed my daughter to see this too. I was giddy at this point.

The bird missed the feather a few times, but there was always a second pass. One time, it even fell out as she entered the nest box hole with it. We intervened, and helped her out. And then, after two successful retrievals, I decided we needed to offer more. My daughter would be the one to tackle our throw pillows in the living room. They drop feathers all the time. And so, there we stood, in the yard offering up tiny white and light brown feathers to a bird building a nest in our meadow. With 4 more feathers from our living room pillows.

The last feather retrieved in this film I had to show twice. In slow motion, it still is not enough to capture what this moment was like. And I am still not entirely sure I will ever have a moment like this again. But if some things are so wild so chase after, you don’t even know it’s worth it. But feathers are worth chasing apparently.

If I knew that when I recorded Episode 20 in March, that I would be writing this in May, I probably would not have believed even myself. But the tree swallow went after what it wanted. And that in itself, is an amazing lesson to learn from something that never touches the ground*, and weighs between 16 and 25 grams.

*They do land on the ground to collect bits of grass and other natural materials. But they really spend so much time aloft, or perched. I filmed this on my driveway a few days ago.

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Author’s note: This was a week of firsts for me. In my volunteer work with Wild Bird Research Group, Inc., this past week I was able to hold that 20 grams in my own hand, at the banding research station. That too, was a magical day as well. Holding tree swallows requires a little extra experience because of their long wings and short legs. (Photo courtesy of Cody Panek, WBRG).

Mind the Gap.

I genuinely wasn’t prepared for how wide it was.

I came home to find a gap in my own garden. And also, one in this space too. We planted a meadow in 2017. A rain garden in 2018. I started writing about it that same year. And for a long time, not too many people were reading. I just kept showing up.

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This newsletter has grown faster than I ever expected lately, and each time I sit down to record and to write now, I feel that gap…between where I started and wherever this is going.

A hard freeze two weeks ago didn’t help matters. And the spring ephemerals have already finished their moment. What you’re left with is a lot of green and not much to identify yet.

There’s a name for what you’re seeing. And a reason it exists. Episode 27 is about that gap.

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Audio recordings of the wood thrush provided by xeno-canto.org:

Citation
Paul Driver, XC771930. Accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/771930.

License

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0

Back in the day, children used to hold a small yellow flower, a buttercup, up to anyone’s chin. Gone away like playing marbles or catching toads, it is unfortunate. The lost practice was supposed to denote their love for butter, or their distaste for it, depending on the glow it produced on the skin.

A flower in the same family, Ranunculaceae, the Eastern red columbine, has a strange glowing effect on me. If I am anywhere in the proximity of one, I have to stop and stare for at least 5 minutes. The flower is just something I want to hold on to. While it does nothing to my chin, it does something to my heart for sure.

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This non-gardener is full of admiration and heart palpitations right now. And it is not because I have been watching too many episodes of Bridgerton. (Though, it’s seriously the top pick of my watchlist right now.)

There are pockets of little Eastern red columbine popping up all over my yard, barely part sun in most cases, and it seems to love being near rocks. The rougher the situation, the better, even pea gravel.

It only blooms in spring, before slinking away from the bright sun of summer. Leaving you wanting more. Then again, maybe that adds to its charm.

Green leaves as thin as cilantro erupt with a thin bowed stem, ever so slightly hairy. Some wild columbine apparently reach 3 feet high. A watermelon red accented by yellow stamens. The flower grows down, facing to the ground. And I guess that adds to its mysticism. Like it needs any more. While I don’t see the similarity to “eagles talons” that the genus Aquilegia suggests, I am in no place to argue with a plant I am crushing on this hard.

When I say “I’m not a gardener”…I sort of say it tongue in cheek. I find peace amid blooms and flowers, but I am not skilled in the way of starting from scratch. Talk “sowing” to me, and you may as well expect I will tune out eventually. I am just not there. YET.

That may be why I get so excited with some of the plants in my yard being so darn good at self-seeding. Though, it makes keeping up with garden maps and plant lists a little tricky when your wild bergamot / bee balm has a mind of its own. However, I find new things landing where they may adds a charmed touch to a suburban plot in the middle of my populated state. A state known for people asking: “Oh, yeah? What exit do you live off the NJ Turnpike?” I would be 9, if you must know.

But there are two plants in particular that I have dabbled in planting them from seed myself. The seeds of an Eastern red columbine look smaller than poppy seeds. After falling hard for this plant about 7 years ago, I wished for more.

I wondered if my lack of a green thumb would land in failure, or should I just gave it go? A plain brown papery husk is all that is left of that dangling candelabra by fall but inside are dozens of tiny black bits of magic pixie dust: seeds. What is the worst that could happen?

When my butterfly weed split its pods in early fall, I took the small soft bits of white floof and placed some of the brown seeds in some sunny spots. Layering them in a small blanket of mulch, I was hopeful. Whether I was doing it right, or even if I wasn’t, there was that simple joy of hands to the Earth.

With the seeds of the Eastern red columbine I was a little more cautious. Holding those seeds felt more like grains of sand to me. I couldn’t risk losing one. To me, they truly are magic. Would this work?

Within my own yard, it worked apparently, as there are several blooming at several stages. Another small, but winsome fascination. Some, like the one above, are ready for the ball. Others, are still waiting for their dance card to be punched. They are small, closed, and not showing any color. I think it has to do with how long they have been established in the ground. More seasoned at the soiree. Apparently, a full bloom doesn’t happen in the first year of sowing…but I am no expert. But micro-climate/shade level could also be a factor. Perhaps sheer affection too? Soon enough, they will swell with color just like the others.

If I had a dance card, this would be on it. I’m going to take maybe just a few more dozen pictures. One day, I hope to see a hummingbird coming to the flower. I know it does happen. I just haven’t been in the garden at the exact right moment…my heart will not race as fast as a hummingbirds, but it will race nonetheless, just as it always does.

Now my question is....did that sparrow just decide, tonight is the night. And Canada is it’s destination? I wonder.

But here’s what absolutely amazing that I only learned a few years ago. Some birds have high site fidelity which means they return to the same location year after year. Not all birds have the same loyalty. But some do. Some, down to 100 meters of the previous year’s nest.

Birds can navigate an entire continent, survive a winter somewhere else a thousand miles or more away, including evading predators, and habitat loss along the way. And then return. How?

This week’s podcast is about a bird with the number ending in -7072 stamped on a band on his leg, and the importance of a day on the calendar. Both, his and mine.

For the full story on this bird, and more information about the organization I mention in the podcast, please see this article I wrote last May.

The organization for which my husband and I volunteer, and with whom these birds are banded is The Wild Bird Research Group.

All birds handled with proper permits and training.

Common Yellowthroat Sound Recording provided by:

Citation
William Whitehead, XC720362. Accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/720362.

License
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0

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