By KAREN MADORIN
The months after Christmas until mid-to late March are the most difficult of the year in my opinion.
Spring and summer have always warmed my heart as well as my back as I bend over tomato plants in the garden or flowers growing in their beds. Over time, I learned to love fall with all its color and pre-frigid weather symphonies despite knowing what comes next.
However, winter is a struggle. It requires effort to celebrate long nights and colorless days. Years ago, an unexpected visitor brightened our lives and gave me a happy memory.
While gazing at our dusty, forlorn yard, wondering how it would survive continued drought, a small brown creature, looking a great deal like a moving piece of bark circling the trunk of our elm, caught my eye. It started at the bottom and moved corkscrew-like up the tree to the suet basket where it stopped to noodle the fatty, seed-laden glob. After feeding, it continued spiraling upward.
At first glance, I thought our newcomer was an out-of-season wren, but it didn’t fly or feed like a wren. It was small and colored much like summer wrens, but I’d never seen those birds maneuver around a tree the way this little guy did while picking delicately with a down-curved bill into bark crevices.
I called in reinforcement — my husband — and we dashed for the bird book and binoculars. I don’t do so well with binocs, so I scanned pages while my other half noted the creature’s long prop-like tail, mottled wing feathers, and unique bobbing flight, much like a woodpecker’s.
After eliminating all possible wrens, we found our fellow on the same page nuthatches occupy. That ID seemed timely as it shared the tree with several of those upside-down crawling avians throughout the morning.
While nuthatches maneuvered the world in reverse, the brown creeper circled the trunk, poked into nooks and crannies, snacked on suet, and then bobbed beyond our sight.
Certhia Americana was our welcome guest.
According to my bird book, this newcomer is a “common but inconspicuous small woodland bird.” On an internet site, one writer stated, "His head, which is as the sentient handle to a very delicate instrument, is moved with such science, such dentistry, that one feels and appreciates each turn of it."
The article itself fascinated me as the author published his work in 1948 in a Smithsonian Museum publication. Apparently, brown creepers’ charms include the fact it’s rarely seen with movements so artful one can’t help but fall under its spell.
For two weeks, we made certain the suet basket was filled, even making an emergency stop in Hays when I accidentally bought a seed block instead of suet for the cage-like feeding station. Our visitor rewarded us with frequent returns to that aged elm.
Though temps required me to wear a coat outside, and our trees stood leafless in a yard dry and dusty, my days brightened. I looked forward to seeing that brown creeper sharing our tree with hordes of nuthatches, juncos, flickers, woodpeckers, and a growing flock of chickadees.
Watching this tiny bird charmed away my wintry blues. I only have to think about that memory to brighten the present.
Karen Madorin is a retired teacher, writer, photographer, outdoors lover, and sixth-generation Kansan.