This happened a week ago. Whatever I saw, it’s gone now. I’ve been back. It hasn’t. But I keep wondering what it was. Here are the facts. I was walking through a meadow of knee-high dead grass. In the distance there are woods with mostly bare trees. It’s early November. Gray and cool. I saw a flock of starlings, some juncos, un-migrating robins, nothing special. A crow flew overhead, far away. There was a blue jay in one of the trees. They used to be more common, but West Nile decimated their population in our area a few years ago. Nice to see a blue jay, always. As I moved further on the trail I saw a flock of cedar waxwings in a small tree. They’re drab and don’t look like bird-book waxwings at first, but give them a second look and you’ll see the crest and slight coloring. Then I saw a bird I couldn’t place. It looked like a sparrow or possibly a big, late, fall warbler. It had a bit of yellow on its side. Don’t get excited, I know a siskin when I see one. This wasn’t. It also had orange on its face, and a black cap. The beak wasn’t fat or thin. It flew in a jerky pattern and landed on a weed not far from where it started. Orange-red on the sides of its face, maybe some white, too, and a black cap; yellow markings on the side. I don’t know. Maybe it’s a siskin that flew through a paintball war or something. In any case, it’s long gone. But what was it? Anybody have any ideas?
