Ready to greet spring and head outside? The Web provides helpful information for Western New Yorkers eager to shake that cabin fever! For example, the 11,000-acre Iroquois National Wildlife Refuge, midway between Buffalo and Rochester, hosts thousands of geese and ducks during their spring migration. Visitors to the refuge also can watch and hear bald eagles tending their nests, thanks to video cameras and microphones strategically placed in the nesting area. The Great Outdoor Recreation Pages (GORP) http://www.gorp.com/gorp/resource/us_nwr/ny_iroqu.htm has directions and visitor center hours.

The Round the Bend Online Travel Guide to Upstate New York http://www.roundthebend.com/ will lead you to a variety of greater Niagara and Finger Lake year-round travel destinations. For a fun spring destination, check out the guide's listing of maple sugaring sites at http://www.roundthebend.com/nyssugr.html. While most of the listings state that they are open year round, phone numbers are included for information on the availability of tours and demonstrations.

You don't need a travel guide to find a place to fly a kite in this breezy area, but you may want some kite-flying tips. Try Kitez.com http://www.kitez.com/, the Web site that bills itself as the "laziest way to find kite sites." If it's kite-flying information you need, Kitez.com will lead you to it, including listings of kite festivals, kite plans, "very easy" kite plans, kite discussion groups, etc.

Who can think about spring without thinking about baseball? And in Western New York, that's Buffalo Bisons baseball-sorry, Blue Jays fans. The Bisons' Web site at http://www.bisons.com has ticket information for the April 5 opening game of the team's 116th season. Other links on the site include the "Press Box," with Bisons' statistics, team roster, ETC.; "Bisons History;" links for "Young Fans;" information on the ongoing "Thruway Series" rivalry, and announcements of upcoming special events, such as the return of the Beach Boys to sing in the summer August sunshine and heat.

But that's another season!