“I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields, that it kisses them so gently? And then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt; and perhaps it says, “Go to sleep, darlings, till the summer comes again.” —  Lewis Carroll, “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland / Through the Looking-Glass”

It looks as though winter has come. Not a surprise, but it seemed to be down the road, only to appear suddenly, with snow squalls, wind, freezing temperatures — the whole package. Winter seems to have dropped in to provide all it has to offer in the Upper Peninsula for November. After all the mild temperatures October and early November provided though, welcome seasonal conditions have come almost as big surprise.

For birds like ducks, grebes, and other waterbirds, the freezing temperatures have brought some changes on some of the smaller bodies of water beginning to close over with a skim of ice.

Much of that will be temporary but continued sub-freezing nighttime temperatures will slowly cap some ponds and eventually lakes.

There is still lots of lively duck activity in the Marquette area but some of the divers are starting to move on. In the Lower Harbor in Marquette at least one black scoter was still continuing between the pedestrian piers on the south side of the ore dock.

Mallards have begun to more around more too, mixing with the smaller number of divers in a few spots. Elsewhere in the Lower Harbor redhead ring-necked ducks, greater scaup, bufflehead, common goldeneyes, and hooded mergansers have been seen.

Horned and red-necked grebes have also continued in the area.

On the backwater of the Dead River near the mouth mallards were seen cutting around a beautiful pair of hooded mergansers last Tuesday. The male put on a bit of a show, lifting his crest between dives for crayfish and small fish.

The female also raised her head feathers from time to time. Eventually they will head to southern Wisconsin or the Lower Peninsula in search of small bodies of open water.

Adult hooded mergansers are stunningly different. In the backwaters of the Dead River, the females virtually disappear in tan and dun brown plumage. Crests have a hint of red in them and in late afternoon sunlight that red can jump out.

On Lake Superior the full, bushy crest can be the key to identifying them from a great distance. Adult male hooded mergansers have white breasts, white stripes on their flanks, and large white patches on the sides of their crests that are not fully visible until the crests are fully erect.

It is all the white that can help them stand out when birders are looking for the smallest of the local mergansers. They can easily be mistake for male buffleheads until the crests are up. The Dead and the Lower Harbor in Marquette have been two good spots to find them all fall.

Five trumpeter swans have continued farther up the river in the “Dead River Marshes” and have been heard calling occasionally from some distance up to a quarter mile away.

This is the longest an entire trumpeter swan family has stayed on the Dead River in fall. A larger flock of swans was seen in the Sturgeon River Slough southeast of Chassell recently too.

As other swans have stayed on Trout Lake in Alger County and parts of the Manistique River most of the winter, so local trumpeters may not go far. With a mix of young and adult trumpeter and migrating tundra swans it may be difficult to tell a group in a flock apart, as was the case near Chassell. Tundras rarely stay in the U.P. very long and only very rarely stay more than a few days in early winter,

AuTrain Lake may have hosted one of the largest congregations of ducks this past week. Last Sunday six hooded mergansers, 120 buffleheads, 200 common goldeneyes, and around 200 more ducks farther out on the lake were seen. A few loons have continued throughout the Upper Peninsula with the open waters too, from Alger to Houghton County.

On the songbird watch, a smattering of snow buntings continues to pop up at a number of locations across the central and eastern U.P. Blue jays have also been active and prominent this fall in the U.P. The abundant acorn crop may have benefited local birds and enticed migrant blue jays to linger.

Blue jays have a special pouch in their throat enabling them to pack two or even three there, another in their mouths, and carry off one more in their bills. They can then take them to a spot to stash for later use. With the great competition for foods in the fall, getting a large store of food for winter use here where those left on the ground may get buried under several feed of ground, storing them now requires quick work in autumn.

A flock of around eleven wild turkeys has been seen moving between the Upper Harbor ore dock and Presque Isle park. They may be competing with the area squirrels and the blue jays for the remaining acorns and maple seeds left from great seasons of both this fall.

With the closure of the park road from the breakwall to the parking lot on the west side of the “Island” it is a bit easier for the flock to move safely through the area. Several flocks have been reported in the Houghton area too. Birds and humans alike seem to be settling in to winter.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Scot Stewart is naturalist at the MooseWood Nature Center, a writer and photographer.