I saw one new bird for the inventory – an Olive-sided Flycatcher. I used to add species to the inventory every week, but now it doesn’t happen as often.

I also found a new kind of butterfly – a Juvenal’s Duskywing. There were lots of them along Western Valley Road. I’ve seen them every spring, but never identified them before.

This was another big weekend for aspen girdling. I did one clump on the point of Sumac Corner Prairie, and then another group north of Indian Grass Prairie. It’s fun imagining what the areas will look like when all the aspen are gone and the savanna has come back. There are lots of old open-grown oaks that will look great when everything around them has been cleared.

On our walk down the front of the Knife Edge we found a fawn curled up under a birch tree. It watched us but didn’t move at all.

Then, the next day, we saw it again in the same place. It looked beautiful, folded up into a tiny circle in the grass.

One of the woodchucks behind the house was busy building a nest. It made numerous trips up to the woods for a mouthful of leaves, then down the cliff to the flat area by the house, and then across to a hole in the rock. Once I surprised it close to the hole. It dove in, and then stuck its head out and watched as I took a picture and walked within a few feet of the hole. It must have thought it was invisible.

There were tiny brown slugs on the driveway – at least one every 4 or 5 feet.

One evening just after sunset we walked down the driveway to the wetland and Mike recorded the spring sounds. We could hear Woodcocks doing their spring mating dance, and Spring Peepers, and some Common Yellowthroats. On the way back we saw two bats flying across the field.