“Learning to sing”- I imagine your yard is as full of nesting birds as mine, perhaps where you live the birds are already into a second brood. I still have trouble sleeping, but the delight of that is that I know exactly who the first birds to tune up are. In my yard, that would be the Song Sparrow.
And here is what you can listen for; songbirds, like the Song Sparrow, learn to sing through imitation of their elders and it takes place in the first few months of their lives. Lately, I have been entertained at 4:30 am by what I believe are the early attempts of a young Song Sparrow to get the hang of its theme song. It is still incomplete by a few notes, picture Beethoven’s Fifth with only “ta da da” rather than “ta da da dah”. The complete refrain will come in time, but it lets me know that right now, out my window is a young sparrow newly fledged.If you have any White Throated Sparrows in your neighborhood, listen for their voice lessons.
As adults their song will sound like “Old Sam Peabody, Peabody, Peabody” or at least that is the way New Englanders hear it, Peabody was a formidable family in the area throughout our early years. But my young one says “Old Sam Pea” then repeats, “Old Sam Peabod”, then tries again. Ah, such perseverance, and again the complete tune will come in time.
Another topic we will attempt to deal with is finding pictures of the zooid form of sea stars, crabs etc. I had a lot of tide pool programs to do this spring and I always wish I had some way to show the children the “baby pictures”, as it were, of the animals they are finding. As much as a caterpillar looks nothing like a butterfly, neither does a zooid
crab look anything like the crab it will become. 
So, sometime this summer let’s try to write about that, a “Who’s Who” in the zooplankton world.
And, don’t let me forget to write a word or two about the Marvels of Mummichogs: one of the hardiest fish anywhere, the first fish to blast into space, the one that I am about to go do a program on today.
How does that song about Winnie the Pooh and Christopher Robin go?
“Help me if you can I’ve got to get
Back to the House At Pooh Corner by one
You’d be surprised there’s so much to be done
Count all the bees in the hive
Chase all the clouds from the sky”
It feels representative of life these days-so much to be done. But I wish you all well, and my hopes are for slightly more time in July for us to share our sightings and musings together. Of course, at some point we need to go to Texas to look for our house, for, what if the shocking possibility that someone may buy our house, comes to pass? Maybe I would really get a chance to study “in the field” for I would be living in one!
Until then, enjoy the teaming life around you, summer is here, officially and nature is on full display. Now, excuse me while I go “chase a few clouds from the sky”.
