BY JOHN KARRIGAN
My usual trek in the park starts down Karrigan Way, the asphalt path down the hill to Powderhorn Lake from the corner of 35th Street and 15th Avenue. However, in these winter months, the path is covered with snow and/or ice so I often approach the park and lake from the parking lot at the building. This gives me a different view—not the panoramic view I get from Karrigan Way. As you all notice, the park board has still not put up the Karrigan Way signs on the “Karrigan Way” that I am expecting soon.
However the view does not change the fact that there have been few “small birds” this winter. I attribute this to the recent removal of so many ash trees. I know there are birds in the area because they still come to the backyard feeders.
Of course, hundreds of people were concerned about the lack of January and February bird columns. Actually there were two or three people who did ask me about it! I see that I didn’t even make any notes for January so I’ve tried to come up with some items for a March column in the much awaited March Southside Pride.
One happening—the repair and rebuilding of the “Tea House” on the south shore of the lake—was in process and completed in December, which should be good for the lake and park.
Rain and weather took out much of the ice on the lake in mid-December and, at times, many Canada Geese, Ring-billed Gulls and a few Mallard Ducks returned to the lake. However I seldom saw any normal songbird-type of birds in the park in December.
The back yard was about normal for December with Downy Woodpeckers, Cardinals, Goldfinches, Juncos, Chickadees and English Sparrows.
I did come up with something I thought was important when I was going to change my name to “Heap of Birds,” which I learned about at All My Relations Art Gallery on Dec. 10. The Native American art gallery is on Franklin Avenue, almost in Powderhorn. I then found out that the “Heap of Birds” family is a well-established Southern Cheyenne-Arapaho family of artists and leaders, and they did not want me taking on their name.
So much for December and January.
On Feb. 20, much surface water appeared on about two-thirds of the lake, and I saw about a dozen Canada Geese come in for an inspection. They could not be fooled and returned to the east, probably to eat the abundant grain available along the railroad tracks at the grain elevators on Hiawatha Avenue (Highway 55).
Again, backyard birding was pretty good in February: a pair of Cardinals almost every day in February, a pair of Blue Jays on the 21st, a pair of Downy Woodpeckers on the 22nd, four or more Goldfinches (not yet gold) most every day, along with Chickadees, Nuthatches, Juncos and English Sparrows about every day.
The poem below does not have a lot to do with birds, but since I don’t have a lot of bird information and since I wrote about Tundra Swans in my previous (December) column, I thought I would throw it in. It is connected to an organization I am part of called Remembering with Dignity (RWD), which works to get grave markers for the thousands of unmarked graves at many cemeteries of former or ongoing Minnesota State institutions and hospitals.
A Long and Unusual Tundra Swan Migration
This poem is dedicated to Swan Anderson (1864-1913), a patient who died at Fergus Falls State Hospital.
By John Karrigan (with Bryan Boyce and Cow Tipping Press)
Instead of coming from the tundra, he came from Sweden.
He came, I suppose,
by boat and train.
Do we know how long he was here? 30 years.
True tundra swans don’t stay in Minnesota. They get refreshed here, then turn from the Mississippi to the east coast.
They stay until the winter gets really terrible. It’s 1500 miles from the tundra to here.
He didn’t do it on a yearly basis. He stayed for 30 years.
He came from Sweden to get refreshed for 30 years.
Fergus Falls was the biggestinstitution by a long shot.
It’s gigantic. And beautiful in a weird way.
His spirit joined a big flock.
Each fall it passes down the river.
Of course they don’t fly across the Atlantic back to Sweden.
He waited 14 years for Charles Lindbergto take his spirit back to Europe. A long but troubled time in the United States.
Comments and observations are always welcome. Send them to me, in care of Southside Pride. Thank you.
