Pileated Woodpecker

Boy, the weather has been crazy this winter. It was 50 degrees today, despite the fact that it's still January, and it's supposed to be 60 tomorrow. (Then it'll go back to the 30s and 40s again, but no sign of snow in the near future.) Just to underscore the total spring-ness of today, a moth spent some time flying around outside my office window a couple of hours ago. Go back to sleep, moth!

Anyway, with weather so nice, how could I not go out to the woods today? The lake ice at Naugatuck State Forest was all melted around the edges, enough for a pair of Mallards to be paddling around in the water, and a Belted Kingfisher was doing some fishing. The best part of the walk, though, was a bird that I only glimpsed briefly, from far away, before it flew off deeper into the woods:

Pileated Woodpeckers are totally the best, in my opinion, and this female (I think) was busy chiseling a nice big hole way up in this tree. Usually, I just see the holes that these birds make, and I haven't actually seen the woodpeckers themselves in a while, so I was excited to cross paths with this big girl. :)

I kept expecting to hear Spring Peepers today, it was so warm, but we're not quite there yet.... If we're not actually going to have real winter (i.e. snow), can't we just skip to spring?