The varied thrush told me it is spring, as did the warmish temperature, sun, and a brace of eagles circling low over Chicken Ridge. The eagles warned that it is also a time of famine for the big birds by hunting cats in the neighborhood. Aki and I headed to the Fish Creek delta to check its grassy wetlands for migrating waterfowl.

The parking lot was empty when we arrived so it was no surprise to hear the complaints of unseen ducks and geese when we approached the pond. We spot hundreds of nervous birds through a screen of trees on the pond’s edge. Some sound like geese, but not our Canada residents. Even though I am hundreds of meters away, the birds explode into the air when I start taking pictures. In minutes they are gone.

As punishment for displacing the birds, I find the glacier hidden behind clouds. Maybe it is not punishment. The clouds reveal enough of the ice field mountains to create beautiful reflections in the waters of Smuggler’s Cove.