Birds have consumed my daytime hours as the slush flows down the mountains and no footwear matches. Snow spikes, crampons, snowshoes, studded strap-ons, duck boots… all are ineffectual in this climate. Sure you can walk around town just fine these days. The snow is almost completely melted on the city streets. But get into any of the parks where birds might be glassed (sighted with binoculars) and your in a pickle. Just the other day I traversed a route up to the Peace Pagoda on Mt. Moiwa that had quite a few soft snow danger points. But spring is definitely upon us now. Temperatures recently spiked at 19° C. My search for an elusive Eurasian Bullfinch continues.

This transitional period can be the toughest, especially in the parks outside the city. And these last few weeks leading up to this thaw are a bit frustrating for birders. How to stay engaged with birding while trapped indoors? I worked out some new tangentially related hobbies during some of our late winter snowfalls that I plan on carrying forward in the coming birding season when inclement weather ruins a expected day out.

Sketching birds always seemed beyond my artistic level, but I figured I could at least give it a decent shot. With the help of some guidebooks, while dutifully copying basic bird shapes very slowly, I think I am making decent progress. My current text, Drawing Birds by Raymond Sheppard, is simple and has gotten me to put some lead to paper.

Though I am just at the mimicking stage and  have yet to sketch anything in the wild, I may get there soon enough. It will prove satisfying on those days where all you see are Japanese tits (that’s my last raunchy bird name joke, I promise).

Another way I have been nerd leveling-up from the comfort of my apartment is though the board game Wingspan and its most recent Asia expansion. Wingspan Asia has a solitaire play mode which has allowed me to geek out on birds for an ungodly amount of hours. So as the snow piled up on my balcony this winter I was often in an intense bird board game session, playing against my ultimate rival… myself. Good times were had and I like to think I have learned a little more about birds of this region. Soon I will put these distractions away and buckle down for some intense (real-life) migratory birding sessions. All in good time.