Dot!

   For the past few weeks, crows have been visiting the yard quite often.  They come with their usual ruckus and nosiness.  Even a single crow can throw the whole place upside-down because of the incessant cawing.  All of the songbirds go into a frenzy.  The Critter Neighborhood Watch Group get themselves all tied up in a tizzy trying to scare the crow away or, at least, let everyone else know that a "wicked" bird is in the area. (like the other birds could not hear it on their own).  

  While I like crows, I do not like some of their actions.  There is only one reason for the crows to be lingering about the place.  Nope, they are not wreaking havoc on my cornfield because I do not have one.  These birds are here to raid the songbirds' nests.  They will steal the eggs and even the baby birds.  The same goes for squirrels' nests.  Baby squirrels are not overlooked by the marauding crows.  This saddens me but I understand that it is all a natural occurrence so I try to not interfere...too much.

  The single crow visiting today was high in the top of a dead oak tree.  With the branches being leafless, the crow could see the entire yard.  It had that "bird's eye view" of any nearby nests.  When I heard the bird cawing, I set out to shoo it away from the wrens' nest.  Perhaps, I could save her little ones.  The crow only stayed a few moments before flying across the Bayou but not before I got a few photographs.  

  Once viewing the pictures, I realized that I had a name for this particular crow.  This was Dot...male or female.  Dot was named because the bird had a single white dot on its face.  Whether this was a marking on the feathers or simply something stuck there, I will never know.  It is most likely a tick that has attached itself to a "safe haven" on the bird's face as it is a difficult spot for any bird to preen.  Thankfully for the crow, if it is indeed a tick, there will be no long term ill effects.  The tick will eat and when full will eventually drop from the bird.  Even predators have predators, I guess.

Jays vs Hawks

   The (Critter) Neighborhood Watch Clan has been on high alert for the past several weeks.  A pair of hawks has been lurking in the trees of the yard and have been snatching unsuspecting birds.  Several months ago, the same thing happened and I had to quit feeding the birds in the feeders.  Visiting the feeders made them fat, lazy and easy targets for the hawks.  After a few weeks, the hungry pair moved on and hunted elsewhere.  Not wanting to start the whole rigmarole over again, I took to spreading seeds on one of the flower benches.  That worked exceedingly well until squirrels and raccoons started ripping through the flower gardens in search of errant seeds.  The bench feeding had to stop and ground feeding commenced.

  Now, the hawks have decided that the birds being five feet from the house under the overhang of jasmine vines is an open invitation.   The predators have no problem zipping down from the hickory tree, dodging the roses and fence posts and swerving through the jasmine vines to pick off a dove.  It saddens me to find the piles of feathers left behind after the hawk devours its prey.  The latest find was that of a blue jay.

  But, as I said earlier, the Neighborhood Watch Clan is on high alert (literally high alert.)  It seems as if the blue jays have appointed themselves as guards over the other birds that come to eat.  There is a tall oak tree that has a few dead limbs at the very top (thanks to Hurricane Zeta).  Each morning at sunrise for the past two weeks, a blue jay can be found perched there.  That jay sits there calmly watching and waiting.  If the hawks make an appearance, the jay starts to yell.  Soon jays fly in from all over the place to join in the cacophony of warnings.  Then, thrashers, cardinals, blackbirds, mockingbirds and even the tiny wrens start with the harassment of the hawks.  Usually, the hawks give way to the other birds and they fly to the back of the Bayou.  The Critter Neighborhood Watch Clan rules!  While most folks seek out squirrel proof feeders, I am pondering a hawk proof area.  Not sure how that is going to work but it is necessary.

The "Down Under" Birds

   I love feeding the songbirds that are fulltime residents or are migrating visitors to the Bayou.  I consider the birds among my friends so  why wouldn't I share a meal with them?  You can imagine how it wounded me to see that I was fattening them up for the small hawk that is also a resident here.  The Cooper's Hawk found that the birds were easy pickings from the feeders as it sat in the nearby hickory tree.  After finding the telltale feathers of a recent kill, I decided to stop putting seeds in the feeders.  I just could not...would not enable a hawk to have easy access by my doings.  If the hawk caught a bird anywhere else, so be it but I would not make them "sitting ducks", so to speak.  The songbirds did not understand this sudden lack of foodstuffs and often scolded me if I was nearby.  It was a quandary.  Do I neglect the songbirds?  Do I allow the hawk to feed?  Puzzlements.

  Well, things always have a way of working out for the best.  The constant scolding from the cardinals, chickadees and titmice finally convinced me to buy more birdseed.  To semi-protect the little birds I had to come up with a new plan.  I had to outsmart the hawk or, at least, make it more difficult for the predator to feast upon the songbirds.  Now, the birds have gone "down under".  No, I did not send them to Australia.  I simply put the seed under the flower benches next to Puddle Pond.   The smaller birds eat in peace and drink safely from the Pebble Creek under the cover of overhanging plants.  In fact, the hawk seems to have gotten the idea that it would be simpler to look elsewhere for prey.  It has not been visiting as often as it had in the past.  Maybe the birds are tad safer now.

Hiding The Birds!

  Since my days are limited to the small gardens, I have become quite acquainted with the few critters that visit daily.  In the recreated "Puddle Pond", a few tiny frogs are happy to provide chirps, six fat squirrels raid the bird feeder and dozens of birds come to visit.  I consider all of them to be my friends and they do not seem to mind my prattle.  They sit and stare while I hold conversations with them pretending they can answer.  (Yes, life with limits is boring but, at least, it is still life! Life is good.)

  It is not often that a large predator makes its way into the small gardens.  Most are quite dubious about the fences.  Birds of prey, however, are not bound by fences.  One visited.  It broke my heart.  On an early morning stroll in the east side of the small gardens, I noticed something white fluttering in the soft breeze.  On closer inspection, that "something white" turned out to be a small feather.  Then, I stumbled upon a mound of feathers.  These belonged at one time to a mourning dove.  My heart was breaking as I knew that the pair had just fledged their two little ones.  The family of four was now down to three.  One of the adults fell prey to a hawk.

  Doves have a funny (and useless) defense when threatened by a predator.  The birds, being mostly ground feeders, simply squat in place.  They do not seek shelter among the brambles as the cardinals do nor do they put up a collective fight like the blue jays.  They sit. They simply sit.  They are literally "sitting doves"...a play on the old saying "sitting ducks".  This sitting makes them prime targets for hawks.   A hawk can swoop down, grab the dove and never miss a wing beat.  It is that easy for them. Hawks pluck the feathers of a captured songbird before eating it.

  With the realization that I was fattening the songbirds for a hawk's dining pleasure, I have amended my ways.  Instead of overfilling the feeder, I now put enough there to satisfy the squirrels but sprinkle lots of seeds under the benches, large leafed plants and vine arbors.  Small birds can easily scavenge the brambles but a hawk's wings cannot navigate there.  The birds are safer there.  My friends sometimes need a bit of protection and I am happy to provide it for them.

This One Is Getting Brave!

  Normally, the Eastern Towhees are shy birds that would rather stay in the underbrush unseen than be sociable.  You may hear them  as they scavenge in the leaves for food but seeing them is a different story.  When scratching, they sound like a herd of elephants rummaging around in a haystack.  They really do not care who hears them.  You may also see the male calling high up in a tree top but that is usually when his ladylove is on the nest.  He keeps a careful watch for predators as she is nesting on the ground where critters roam.  Other than that,  their whole lives are spent in the thick underbrush.   If the hillside is unusually quiet and the other birds have left the feeders, the towhees will occasionally sneak out to pick up a few discarded seeds.  More oft than not, the male will be seen first.  After it appears that no one is going to bother him, the female will venture out of the brush and join him for a few seeds.  

  This morning, I headed out to see how many boards were ripped from the pier during the storms overnight.  The errant boards were retrieved and placed within easy reach, then I headed back up the hillside.  A slight movement caught my eye and was enough to make me pause for a few moments.  Yep, the little towhee was busying himself near the house!  I watched for a bit then continued back to the doorway.  To my surprise, the towhee did not take flight.  He stayed near the jasmine fence even though that was in my direct path.  

  After my encounter with the male towhee, I started pondering if the female was nesting nearby.  Since I leave the landscape a bit "wild and woolly". anything is possible.  For the past few years, she has nested in the palmetto clumps near the pier but a rather large snake has been hanging around there.  The Black Racer would make short work of the eggs, chicks or even the mom.  Hopefully, she has found a safer place...maybe the jasmine fence row?  How neat would that be??  That would explain why the male is so near to the house and gardens.  They would be welcome to stay!

Why Don't You Fly?

  There is something about mourning doves that never ceases to cause pondering with me.  How are these birds so calm, cool and collected?  I can usually befriend a lot of the critters on the Bayou after a few weeks of patiently coaxing but songbirds seem to be the hardest to tame.  Shorebirds, on the other hand, are always hungry and looking for handouts.  The smaller birds never want to take the time to visit but those doves will sit for hours with you if they take the inclination to do so.  The whole time they are near, the birds are placidly staring...never moving more than a few inches and never excited.  This often makes me ponder if the birds are just that accustomed to people or if they are possibly just that dimwitted that they do not understand fear.  Sitting next to any unknown critter can be a bit unnerving but not for the doves.  They just take it all in stride.

  Mark and I came up the hill from fishing and spied a dove in the birdbath.  Since he has been trying out my camera lately, the dove was a perfect chance to get some practice.  Doves sit still.  They do not hop, wiggle or bob.  They are not skittish and are hard to scare.  So, he started taking pictures.  The dove sat through the entire photo shoot with nary an urge to take flight.  

  After Mark tired of clicking the camera, he handed it back to me.  The dove sat.  Ok, so now I needed a few photographs but instead of staying on the board path, I eased my way nearer the bird.  Neither Mark nor I were particularly quiet as we were talking and he was steadily slapping deer flies.  Soon I found myself within a few feet of the bird and  it still did not budge.  I thanked the bird for its time and patience and turned to go back up the hill.  At the doorway, I looked back to see the mourning dove STILL IN THE SAME PLACE!  What's up with that??  Goodness, I love these birds!

Beautiful Songster

  The Bayou is home to many critters.  One of my favorites is the Brown Thrasher.  This bird, albeit rather drab in color, has one of the most beautiful songs of any bird.  Many folks have a tendency to think the Northern Mockingbirds are the songsters of the avian world and they are mostly correct. I say mostly since if you are going by song alone and not by sight, it is easy to confuse the two.  The happy trilling and warbling blended with clear, crisp single notes is a characteristic common to the songs of both birds.  Sometimes, it is difficult to distinguish one from another simply by song but I will let you in on a little secret.  The Brown Thrasher repeats its notes or phrases only twice before moving on to another, whereas, a Northern Mockingbird sometimes sticks with repeating a note or phrase three, four or even five times.  Both birds have extensive repertoires of over a thousand sounds!  Hearing the thrasher's song never fails to bring a smile plus the birds are attentive to each other's needs and will actually share their meals.

  Earlier, I was out meandering the hillside when I came across a sad sight.  The pair of Brown Thrashers was under the old, oak tree.  This was unusual since I knew that they had a nest full of eggs in the groundsel bush near the pier.  Either one or the other was always sitting on the four eggs in the nest.  Seeing them together and away from the nest stirred a thought.  I had to go check.  Sure enough, the nest had been raided!  No eggs could be found!  The sweet couple had lost their brood before it had even hatched.  Either the recent visit by the marauding crows was to blame or a snake had found the nest. Either way, I was not alert enough to divert the slaughter of the little family.  Now my sweet friends had to start anew.

  Hopefully, the thrashers will choose a nest site a bit closer to the house and away from the marsh.  It is hard for me to keep an eye on the happenings when I am not nearby.  This evening, the male thrasher came to sit on the gate post to sing his lovely song.  His ladylove was stirring around in the jasmine arbor.  How nice would it be to have them nest there!

Who is calling?

  It is not unusual to find birds' nests on my hikes about the hillside.  It is also not unusual to find them in all of our outbuildings such as the shed and greenhouse.  Wrens seem to love nesting in areas near people and do not seem to mind if we check the nests now and again.  I love these little birds.  Their cheerfully jumbled calls fill the air from daylight to dusk as they busily work the gardens hunting bugs.  This year, there is an abundance of bugs which makes gardening a bigger chore but makes the birds' lives much easier.  In a matter of minutes, the busy, little wrens can find dozens of caterpillars or grasshoppers to feed the hungry mouths of their broods.  Mama Wren, who chose the greenhouse as her abode, has not started the task yet as she is still setting on her five eggs. Papa Wren, on the other hand, does bring her an occasional treat.  He is a good husband!

Papa Wren singing in a brush pile.

  This afternoon, my sister-in-law made a visit to the Bayou.  While she was here, we toted mugs of coffee out to the greenhouse.  This is one of her favorite places (as it is mine) to sit and relax.  While there, I showed her Mama Wren's nest and told her to listen to Papa Wren's song coming from behind the greenhouse.  He was guarding his ladylove and was letting any intruders know that he was on duty.  It was not long before she could recognize the song of the wren.  She then made the comment that another wren was singing on the south side of the greenhouse. I listened but had to giggle as it was not a wren. Yep, the song was almost perfect.  Each note was in perfect sequence but after three trills, it stopped and continued in what almost sounded like a whip-poor-will's call.  It was not a wren at all but our resident mockingbird mimicking the call of the wren.  How confusing must this be for the wrens???  

Papa Mockingbird who mimicks the call of the wren.

  The wrens nesting in the greenhouse are Carolina Wrens.  These birds pair for life and stay together year round.  The songs are different between male and female but when they sing together it sounds like one bird singing.  This is something the mockingbird has yet to copy and hopefully will never.  While I love hearing the mockingbird with his never-ending song, it is also nice to be able to hear and distinguish the song of the wrens. 

The Villain

  "Uh uh, Uh uh!"  Someone was denying a fact even before they were accused.  To me, that automatically suggests guilt.  Perhaps I am being hasty in my judgement here but it seems to me that those who yell the loudest are sometimes the guiltiest.  Why go to all of the trouble of being in denial if you are not as guilty as sin?!  "Uh uh! Uh uh!"....once again the phrase was heard making me even more sure of my thoughts.

  This denial was coming from the tall pine tree back behind the shed.  All of the smaller songbirds were in a tizzy making it clear that something nefarious was underfoot...or above head...which seemed more likely.  That familiar noise was the cawing of a crow and its presence was causing a major uproar among my songbird community. What I have been blaming solely on the small Screech Owl may be due to none other than the visiting crows.  "Uh uh!"  Once again, the crow denied knowing anything about the nest raids and the missing eggs and baby birds.  

  I was just about to go "Grandmother" on the crow and start banging on my pie tin when the smaller  birds took things in their own hands...errr....talons...errr...whatever.  The ruckus drummed up by the woodpeckers, cardinals and wrens brought in the fighting forces of red-winged blackbirds.  These are fighter pilots with the best of them.  It did not take long of the five or six smaller blackbirds bombarding the crow to make it vacate the premises!  The rest of songbirds remained quite atwitter as they checked their nests.  Perhaps in all of that chirping, twittering, tweeting a few word of thanks should have been directed toward the red-winged blackbirds who merely went back to their own nests as if the deed was nothing special.  Wouldn't it be great if we humans could find it in our hearts to do good for our communities without expecting to be rewarded.  Good job, red-winged blackbirds! You are brave beyond compare and I salute you!

  The referral to going "Grandmother" was due to my maternal grandmother's habit of grabbing her metal pie pan whenever she needed to frighten off any predator.  Whether it be crows, a pack of wild dogs or a few wild hogs, this was her "weapon" of choice.  There was one time, however, that the pie tin failed her and a pack of wild dogs was attacking the lone pet dog so she grabbed the rifle and let loose on the dogs. Good part was that the pack of dogs scooted towards the woods...bad part was that she was standing on the screened porch at the time she shot.  Granddaddy never let her forget that by showing everyone the telltale holes in the screen...but he always ended his story with how proud he was of her for rescuing the poor pup!  Oh, Grandmother!  I miss you!