Selection from Aldo Leopold's "A Sand County Almanac"

Back from the Argentine

When dandelions have set the mark of May on Wisconsin pastures, it is time to listen for the final proof of spring. Sit down on a tussock, cock your ears at the sky, dial out the bedlam of meadowlarks and redwings, and soon you may hear it: the flight-song of the upland plover, just now back from the Argentine.

If your eyes are strong, you may search the sky and see him, wings aquiver, circling among the woolly clouds. If your eyes are weak, don't try it; just watch the fence posts. Soon a flash of silver will tell you on which post the plover has alighted and folded his ling wings. Whoever invented the word 'grace' must have seen the wing-folding of the plover.

excerpts are from "A Sand County Almanac, with essays on conservation from Round River", by Aldo Leopold and published by Oxford University Press (1966). For more information about Aldo Leopold, see: www.aldoleopold.org An inexpensive paperback version of Sand County Almanac published by Ballantine Books is widely available at book stores or on-line.