Winter visitors

For the past day we have had a winter storm come through. Forecasts as to its impact varied widely yesterday but we ended up with a modest 1-2 inches of snow over night. I had set up my time lapse camera in hopes of making a video of the storm. I was foiled on two fronts. First, the snow didn't start until after dark and second, when it did snow, some collected on the front of the lens and blocked the view. So there isn't even a picture of the yard after the snow fell.
But the storm did bring a load of birds to the backyard. There were almost 30 House Finches running back and forth between the shelter of the pine trees covered with vines and the feeder. It got so busy at times that I started a reservation system.
There were also a full range of sparrows. We had several of the typical White-throated and Song Sparrows plus a Swamp Sparrow, uncommon this far up in the yard. And a Chipping Sparrow; to the feeder, no less.

As the birds were preparing for the storm last night we had a visit by a pair of Northern Flickers.

This morning before breakfast we saw an Eastern Red Fox walking through the back of the yard. It wandered to one side and back to the other, then towards the way back of the yard and then back down the path. Later in the day we went out and could see the prints left in the snow.
And when we continued our walk out into the marsh we had a yard-first: a pair of Eastern Meadowlarks.