Seeing and hearing birds is always a welcome part of my daily run and dog-walks, especially during the winter when signs of life are not as plentiful as they are during other times of the year.

A few mornings ago I got a special treat from a male cardinal high up in a tree.  Its bright red color and bold song livened up my morning walk with Caleb.

It also got me thinking about a couple of other recent memorable bird sightings that that took place on my weekly Saturday morning run along the Chippewa River.

One bitterly cold morning in January—I believe the air temperature was about 10 below zero—my long-time running buddy Dave and I were treated to the sight of two bald eagles perched in trees along the river trail.

While it’s not all that unusual to see bald eagles along the trail that borders the Chippewa River, it was unusual in how close the big birds let us get to them—about 25 yards. It was by far the closet that I’ve ever been to a bald eagle in the wild, as normally they are very wary birds.

A few weeks later, Dave and I enjoyed another memorable bird sighting while running along the Chippewa River Trail. This time we saw a huge flock of robins, some perched in a tree and others on the river ice below.

What so many robins were doing around these parts in January was a bit of a mystery to Dave and me, as we’ve always understood them to be migratory birds that head south for the winter. Seeing them helped to warm us up by giving us something interesting to talk about on such a chilly morning.

The older I get the more I appreciate why human and feathered “snow birds” head south for the winter. The ice, snow, and cold definitely add a difficulty factor to everyday life that make a seasonal migration south more and more attractive.

At the same time, the older I get the more I appreciate the snow birds that stick around the northland during the winter. They help to brighten our day during a time of year when we can use it.