Afield: Which bird signals spring to you?

BRAINERD, MINN. - Legendary conservationist Aldo Leopold once wrote, "One swallow does not make a summer, but one skein of geese, cleaving the murk of a March thaw, is the spring."

Leopold penned those words nearly 70 years ago. That was long before the giant subspecies of Canada geese thrived as it does today. It was also, I assume, before many of the big geese decided city life -- with its warm water discharges and free handouts -- warranted they should stay the winter.

So, to many "city folk," a flock of Canada geese "cleaving" the sky is a common sight throughout the winter, and thus not a true harbinger of spring as Leopold noted.

I don't live near a town big enough to attract "city geese," and so Leopold's words strike a note. To me, a wedge of Canada geese in the March sky, noisily announcing to the world below their northward movement, is indeed spring.

But it wasn't always this way. When I was a kid, I delivered morning newspapers to doorsteps in north Brainerd. Then, there were few Canada geese. Just a sighting near town at any time of the year was notable.

Back then, crows -- like Canada geese -- had yet to adapt to city life. Lacking then were human fast-food chains, and thus French fries were not tossed to waiting crows from parked vehicles as they are today. So, at the time, nary a crow stayed the winter as they do today.

Thus, to me, the initial cawing of March crows was spring. I remember the joy those first crows brought to me as, at dawn, I skipped over frozen mud puddles and stubborn snowbanks, a stack of newspapers under my right arm.

If you travel the country roads, a kestrel perched on a power line might signal spring to you. Or perhaps a huge flock of red-winged blackbirds flying, undulating, strung out across the prairie washes away your winter.

I have a friend who figures it is spring when he hears the first flock of migrating tundra swans. This man loves to listen to northbound swans as they hoot and holler, unseen in the darkness above, as he sits in lantern light atop the rotting grey ice of a lake while plying the depths for crappies.

Sandhill cranes arrive in Minnesota ahead of most other migrants, and they are a favorite spring omen for many people. The big heron-like birds are noisy; they impart prehistoric-sounding cries that will attract the attention of even the most casual observer.

If you enjoy hunting, perhaps your spring arrives with the first drumming ruffed grouse, a dull thud, thud, thud reverberating from an aspen forest. Or maybe it's the thunderous gobble of an amorous tom turkey that is your spring.

Other people judge the coming of spring by the arrival of later migrants such as the colorful Baltimore oriole, any one of the 20-plus species of warblers, or the tiny ruby-throated hummingbird. Depending on where you live in Minnesota, those species will be arriving in a few weeks to a month.