To the Editor:

What is it about birds that we find so fascinating and awe-inspiring? Is it their ability to break the bonds of gravity and freely move in any direction, their ability to navigate across countries or even continents, their songs which capture our imaginations, or their visibility which keeps us so connected to nature?

These were my thoughts recently while visiting the expansive meadows at Holcombe Hill (a wildlife preserve owned by the Newtown Forest Association). Many bird species can be found there but just now the bob-o-links are putting on a conspicuous display, darting up and along the contours of the uncut meadows. It is here that bob-o-links have arrived, will build their nests in the grasses and breed, with young hatchlings appearing by mid-June.

Bob-o-links are especially impressive when we realize that just months ago these birds were wintering in southern South America, migrating some 12,500 miles annually. Throughout its lifetime, a bob-o-link may travel the equivalent of four or five times around the circumference of the earth. A migrating bob-o-link can orient itself with the earth’s magnetic field, thanks to iron oxide in bristles of its nasal cavity and in tissues around the olfactory bulb. Remarkable indeed!

Unfortunately, bob-o-link numbers have declined 75 percent over the past 40 years. This is most likely due to loss of habitat, meadows turning into construction sites or unmanaged meadows returning to forests.  More meadows are needed in Connecticut to support all kinds of ground nesting birds (meadow larks, red-winged blackbirds, etc.) as well as bees, butterflies, and beneficial insects.

Remaining hay fields in the state may serve this purpose but the needs of the farmers and the needs of the birds are often in conflict. While breeding and hatching occur in mid-June, this is often the time when farmers do the first cut in the field, the grass now having enough nutritional value for livestock feed.

Fortunately, the birds who have chosen the Holcombe Hill fields do not have to worry, as cutting of these fields is done on a three-year rotating basis and only until sometime in the fall.

So, it seems to be a bit of bob-o-link paradise, which offers the viewer a sense of serenity and a feeling that,  here at least, all is right with the world.

Mary Wilson

12 Whippoorwill Hill Road, Newtown          June 9, 2015