Signs of Winter

I'm never really convinced winter is here.

The reason is strikingly simple: because it really never does come here in Southern California. Call it what you will, but our winters are just summers in crappy, falling-apart Halloween costumes.

Sure, the predict El Nino will happen every year although it never does and this winter, we even had a miniature version of the 2014 East Coast snow disaster.  But just a paltry three days ago there were enough heat waves rising off from the ground that you could have fried a piece of pork on there and not contract salmonella. The birds can convince anyone otherwise, too. It's not yet February and Wilson's Warblers  are piled up into yellow dollops. Bullock's Orioles are rocking out on the streets to the wagging tails of summer empids. Only the occasional waterfowl waltz-in is an avian wake-up call for birders as to what season it supposedly is.

Sometimes we get enough Ring-billed Gulls at the dumpster to call it a White Christmas, but that's about as close as ho-hum SoCal gets.

Lewis’ Woodpeckers (OC winterers) are essentially woodpecker-flycatchers. How can such a trumpy* thing exist? Ask the strange ways of evolution.

Anything that has a huge, thick bill is automatically lovable. Like this, and this. 

The main difference that winter brings for me is that my suburban yard suddenly becomes completely devoid of anything flying and fruit-colored for a couple months. Unless you count adorable Lesser Goldfinches, which are sort of an aged, moldy banana shade.

Then, there's also the winter irruptions. 

Apparently, SoCal's vacation vibe has infected this winter's irruptive avian visitors, which influxed faster than a load of twitchers to an ABA Code 7 and let birders across Southern Cal have looks that would make any Northerner birder go red. 

There are so many Ancient Murrelets spilling across the SoCal coast that seeing them has already become old. #getthejoke

Varied Thrush outnumbered American Robins this winter. California, you're so weird. 

What are YOUR favorite signs of winter? 

-chiccadee-dee-dee