This is Bird Note.

You may get to know these birds by sound as much as sight.

On a still winter afternoon, walking the shore of Puget or Long Island sound, you'll hear them

coming low across the water. Golden eyes, also known as whistlers, their wings sibilant,

making the sound, as Ernest Hemingway wrote, of ripping silk.

You're likely to see their piercing golden eyes and the striking domino black and white of the male's plumage as you board a ferry or travel by boat along the shore.

Sometimes in squadrons they dive for crustaceans and mollusks.

Autumn brings both species of golden eyes, common and barrows.

You'll know the male barrows by the half-moon of white between its brilliant yellow eye and short bill.

Enjoy them now while you can.

In spring, golden eyes will be gone, returning to the boreal forests of Canada and Alaska to breed and hatch their young in the cavities of trees.

And you'll have to wait until next November to hear again the music of their wings.

For Bird Note, I'm Michael Stein.

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