It’s been several years now since one of my favorite summer birds has come by for the season to brighten me. I would swear they are ventriloquists. Sounding like one was here but really there. Or sounding like one was high in the tree top but no one was there at all. And their sound. Cluck, cackle, click, gobble, chuckle, whistle. Never repeating a sound. Seeming to invent its own bird-words as time passed. I miss the Yellow-breasted Chats (Icteria virens) that always came to visit every summer.
Seems I would hear them whenever I was out. Surely they were greeting me. But clever in their hiding, I would rarely see them. Just a few times I was able to catch a glimpse and snap my shutter capturing one of them in pixels.
It’s early. There are many weeks until summer arrives. I’ll be listening. I’ll be hoping to get that happy whistle once again.