Last week I began the column by writing about the death of David Masch, mentioning there would be a memorial on Sunday, Jan. 26, in Woods Hole. Since then though, the Masch/Swan household has informed me that the memorial for David is not open to the public.

A group of Vineyard birders and biologists were saddened to hear that David (aka Pops) Masch had died. Many folks had met Dave while he was the naturalist, chief cook, father figure/counselor and instructor for the Penikese Island School. Dave was at Penikese for 29 years, and before that he was a biologist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. Dave was an excellent fisherman/shell fisherman and a superb cook.

The shad spirit or Alewife bird is considered by a number of people a harbinger of spring. Ornithologists call this member of the sandpiper family Gallinago delicata. Bird watchers have called this agile flyer common or Wilson’s snipe. As much as I would like to think that spring is right around the corner, Wilson’s snipe cannot be used as an indicator of spring rains, herring runs, blooming shad bush or daffodils.

It could not have been a more perfect morning. There wasn’t a breath of wind and the temperature was well above freezing. A perfect scenario for very early morning owling! The dedicated few, Tim and Whit, were up well before O’dark-hundred. At two a.m. alarm clocks went off and, with Ipods and Iphones in hand, complete with small speakers, the owlers were off to the State Forest, Squibnocket and Aquinnah to listen for owl calls.

Whit Manter and Tim Spahr drove beneath a full moon in the very early hours of Saturday morning, heading for the State Forest. It was 3 a.m. when they arrived at their destination. As soon as they stepped out of the car, they heard an unmistakable sound. Hoo. Hoo hoo hoo.

The Vineyard birders will be up at O’dark-hundred tomorrow for the annual Christmas Bird Count. Sunrise will be at 7:08 a.m. and we have to have eaten breakfast, organized our optics, bins (binoculars) and scope (spotting scope on tripod), made lunch to include all the Christmas cookies so we won’t eat them later, fill plenty of water bottles, and drive to the first location where we are going to count birds.