They are indeed beautiful, catherinet. That last note might really be a cheet. That's probably what threw you off! ;) Regarding writing out bird calls, I wonder who decided the Barred Owl says "Who cooks for you, who cooks for you". Even though I'm in Iowa, I sometimes hear a Barred Owl with a southern accent. I hear "Who cooks for you, who cooks for you all!"

Also, if you look at the range map in the All About Birds site, robins live year-round in most of the 48 lower states. Some people insist that we see different robins in the winter than in the summer - that we're seeing Canadian birds that migrated south and our summer robins flew even farther south. I don't know if this is true - maybe someone here has some information. Claire

There are half a dozen subspecies of American robin. The ones from Newfoundland are sometimes called "black-backed robins", and in addition to being much darker than the more common subspecies are somewhat larger. Birds from the rain forests of the pacific Northwest are also very dark. Probably what you saw was an adult male bird from one of those subspecies.

I'm not sure if this will help, but the best tip I've found to help cover my blueberries with netting is to drive stakes of some sort into the ground and put glass jars upside down on top of the stakes. . That lets the netting slide on and off easily. I weigh the edge down with some bricks, and have a spot at one end where I can pick up the bricks to step under. i use bamboo stakes because they are cheap even in long lengths, so I have three rows of the stakes - one on each side of the blueberry patch and one row down the middle. It lets me get around in there without too much stooping, which I also at my age do not like. If you are having trouble driving stakes in, try using a digging bar to make a small hole first - I use one to make holes for the pvc tubing I use in the garden for making hoop houses.