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It has been many years since I have heard the stillness of a summer night stitched through with the silver thread of the sweet, plaintive song of a Field Sparrow. The effect of this is breathtaking. I use that expression in its true sense for I can remember holding my breath until the little song ends and silence resumes.
I’m in the wrong place now to hear bird songs at night except perhaps that of a Mockingbird that occasionally sings a nocturnal medley from some high perch near this house in Flint Hill. Even that is not heard against absolute stillness; traffic on highway 522 is continuous and creates a running flow even in the small hours of the morning.
I began thinking of birds that embellished the night with song when I was in West Virginia recently. It was a reunion of sorts; a gathering of those who at one time had been students. They are all grown up now and have careers that make me proud: high positions with the Nature Conservancy, director of the Smithsonian’s Insect Zoo and one who is a world class expert on the tropical rain forest canopy.
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