Beginning of November

October ended with a few more sightings of spruce grouse, they always take us by surprise. We have been seeing them quite often, but the other day we stepped out into our courtyard and three of them flew up from right by our feet into the spruce trees. We still occasionally see a hairy woodpecker, sometimes the male and sometimes the female. Chickadees regularly and nuthatches. Gray jays and Steller jays. Magpies. We keep listening for and watching for owls. We have seen more vole activity on the feeders, so that is encouraging, an owl may show up one night on the feeder, and we keep checking late at night as we wake up and look around. Even though it's been cold at times, overall there is not that much ice on the rivers yet, so there is still a lot of bird activity. On a drive from Homer, I saw a lot of eagles, ravens, crows, and gulls. In some ways, it seems like early October. We are anticipating snow and colder weather at any point.