April 18th, 2007
It was a busy day here, but there were still some interesting sightings and events…
First, the birds staged an interesting protest over the fact that I was late in getting out to fill their bird feeders. This photo probably doesn’t do justice to the congregation of cow birds that were sitting outside doing their best impression of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds. Good thing I had plenty of seed in the garage to appease these surly masses.
Also on the bird front, I spotted a bluebird today! No, I didn’t stalk the bluebird houses, as previously planned. I was just sitting quietly at my desk and when I looked up, there she was! I have two witnesses that can vouch for the sighting.
Good day!
Posted In: Nature and Wildlife
Tags: Birds
April 12th, 2007
Glug…glug…twerp twerp! Glug…glug…twerp twerp! What a strange sound for a bird. After doing some research, we found that the song was that of the brown headed cowbird–the bullies of the bird world!
The brown headed cowbird is a medium sized bird with a shiny black body and a brown head. The name comes from the fact that they often hang around livestock that kick up the ground, unearthing bugs and such that provide the bird with food.
But despite this dopey pastoral name, the cowbird is actually quite aggressive and they are the only parasitic bird that is common in Maryland. (There are about 750 types of parasitic birds worldwide.) Each spring, they forego the usual nest building ritual of other birds and instead deposit their eggs into the nests of other birds. What’s more, a recent news article reported that if the “host” bird refuses to feed and raise the baby cowbird, the mamma and daddy cowbird go back and TEAR UP THE NEST of the hostbird.
Mon Dieu! Mafia birds in my back yard! Eating my birdseed!
We have observed that they also seem to travel in mean little cowbird packs and shove around the chickadees. I’m going to give them biker names–Boris, Crazy Eddie, Weird Frank, Pissant and Smoker. I can hear them plotting their assaults…
“Yo, Crazy Eddie. Tell that lady to fill these flippin’ feeders before I get mad and do sumtin’ she’s gonna regret.”
“Hehehe, you’re the boss, Boris. I’ll get the guys and we’ll do a flyby of her Acura. Give her a small deposit of what she can expect if she don’t sees things our way.”
“You bird brains! To really get her attention, you need to show some muskle. Go for the little dogs! I’ll get the fluffy one. Youse guys take out the little silky one. We’ll see if she wants to mess with us guys!”
It’s a harsh world out there.
Posted In: Nature and Wildlife
Hi! I'm Robin Ripley author of Wisdom for Home Preservers, published by Taunton Press. I am also co-author of Grocery Gardening. Bumblebee is about my life in rural Maryland, my garden and my love of food, my little dogs and pet chickens. You can follow me on Twitter, Pinterest and Facebook. Thank you for visiting!
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