They're back, 2017 version

Yesterday brought the year's first dark-eyed junco, perched on the now-bare rose of Sharon hedge outside the dining room. The camera was of course nowhere to be found, but I suspect that most people in the lower 48 are familiar with snowbirds of the non-human variety. In case you aren't, here is a shot of one from the Celebrate Urban Birds section of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology website.

These handsome little sparrows spend their summers in the northwoods of Canada, then head south for the winter. While some of the humans in our part of the world might beg to differ (especially when snow is falling, as it is at the moment), significant numbers of juncos think of Ohio as the South. The junco is not the flashiest of birds, but for me, it is one of the surest signs of winter, just as the first patch of bright yellow on a goldfinch is a sure sign of the approach of summer.

Back before calendars, Google or otherwise, phenomena like these helped humans mark the seasons.