i listened carefully , but-the squirrel having now gone about its own business-heard nothing beyond the normal sounds of a forest waking to spring : the murmur and rush of wind through new-leafed trees , punctuated by the occasional crack of a falling branch , or the rattle of last year 's pinecones and chestnut hulls bouncing through the canopy ; the call of a distant jay , the conversation of a gang of pygmy nuthatches foraging in the long grass nearby , the rustle of a hungry vole in the winter 's dead leaves .