Don't let the last licks of winter scare you off -- Presque Isle State Park is alive with activity, and waiting for warm weather to visit means you'll miss more than you know.
Migrating ducks are on Presque Isle Bay by the thousands. Regal red-breasted mergansers and buffleheads mingle with canvasbacks and redheads. This past weekend, three ruddy ducks in winter plume, their pintails pointing skyward and bills tucked under wings, floated a couple dozen yards off the shoreline at one vista.
Lesser scaups and goldeneyes gathered in Marina Bay, and at least four tundra swans dominated the goings-on in Misery Bay.
Migrating red-tailed hawks spiral overhead this week, and there's at least one great blue heron heronry on the peninsula's backside.
And we haven't event talked about Gull Point. Or resident songbirds.
Take a walk. Take a drive. Take a Thermos of coffee. Just make sure to take your binoculars or scope and an identification guide. Pick up a checklist at the Tom Ridge Environmental Center or the Stull Interpretive Center.