The first robin

"The snow doesn't give a soft, white damn whom it touches."
E.E. Cummings

For our family and friends in the East and Midwest, sorry to hear about your weather. Not to rub it in, but I'm off to Home Depot today to buy potting soil and rose fertilizer. Of course mother nature may still have some tricks in her bag, but our mild January is spilling over nicely into February. And with every week, there's less chance of another hard freeze in Seattle. Although I could still be eating humble pie...

The robins are supposedly year-round residents here, so I guess we don't really have a "first" robin in the spring. It just feels that way, because in the winter, we don't often see them in our neighborhood. But it is a happy day when you lie in bed on a quiet spring morning, and hear the first one singing before dawn. The robin is always the first bird up, all through the summer. You've heard the saying about the "early bird getting the worm?" My favorite little radio program "Birdnote" had an interesting segment called The Early Bird Gets the Worm, but the Late Bird May Live Longer.
The program said this:

Recent research shows... that birds dining early and heavily may lower their life expectancy. A study of three North American woodland bird species found that socially dominant birds stay lean during the day and then stoke up when it is most important – later in the day before a cold night. At night, birds avoid hypothermia by metabolizing fat. And by staying lean through most of the day, dominant birds are more agile in avoiding predators.

Interesting. So just because the robin wakes everyone else up early, doesn't mean they are "socially dominate." Maybe in the bird world, they are just plain old annoying? So, the revised moral of the story is:

Get the worm late in the day-- you'll sleep better and live longer.