Robin watch

A Gazette caller was worried. "Where are all the robins this spring?" she asked. "They're gone!"

Well, they aren't gone, except maybe from that caller's backyard. Risë Foster-Bruder, president of the Aiken Andubon Society, assured us that robins haven't vanished. It's just that they have abandoned their popular harbinger-of-spring role for year-round residency. In fact, the last Christmas Bird Count turned up 295 robins, compared to fewer than a dozen the year before.

Foster-Bruder says robins will move around in winter to avoid the nastiest weather, and then return to higher ground.