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Wed 19 Oct, 2005 08:52 am
I have two sparkler crabtrees outside my kitchen window. I just looked outside and noticed the miniatures apples are now bright red. That means any day now the trees will be filled with passing cedar waxwings and they are going to have one hell of a party. Never fails. They come every year. They seem to know when the apples have the maximum potency and they appear from nowhere and start the drunken orgy.
The little bastards eat those apples like there's no tomorrow and they get drunk as hell.
One day I walked outside and one of the birds was sitting on one of the pickets of my adirondack chair, gently weaving back and forth, his glassy eyes trying to comprehend my approach. I could tell he knew he was in danger but he was too drunk to move. I got close enough to put my face right up to his beak and he lifted his wings in a comically drunken fashion and hopped to the next picket over. I moved over and he hopped back to his original position. Back and forth we went. I could tell that poor bastard was getting sick of the game and desperately wanted to fly away, but all he could do was hop. One picket to another.
I then sat down in the chair and watched him some more. He took flight. Right into my kitchen window. He fell into the flower box and laid there for a second. Then he took off again, flying like the devil was after him and I thought he was going to fly right into my back fence, but at the last second he pulled up and cleared the fence by a heartbeat.
I'm sure he had some good stories for the boys down south that winter. 'He was right in my face! This grizzled old dude. I thought he was going to bite my head off."
I think back to that incident and realize I can really relate to that damn bird. I've had hauntingly similar experiences with cops over the years. They get right into my face; I try to move, but am frozen with fear.
Yep, I sure hope that old boy comes back this year. I'll recognize him from the scar on his beak.
The Saskatoon berries in my backyard seem to be fermenting nicely. I'm looking forward to watching the tipsy lil buggers enjoy their snacks in a coupla weeks.
They're so much easier to shoot when they're drunk.
so you guys are running grog shops. Do you have a permit?
When I lived in N.Y. we lived in a ranch house. There was a picture window in the front, and the back. If the shades were open, you could see right through the front into the backyard.
We had two huge dogwood trees in front of the house. In the fall, when the seeds ripened, and were bright red, the birds would eat themselves silly, and attempt to get into the backyard via the front porch. A number of flickers killed themselves that way. After awhile, I learned to keep the shades closed in the fall, until the seeds were gone.
We now have a number of holly trees. We get an invasion of robins who descend on the trees for a couple of weeks in February, before they make the trip up north. A good size flock of robins can strip a holly tree in ten minutes.
Birds fly into windows because they see the reflection of trees. This is especially a problem in spring and fall when the sun is lower in the sky. Here is a good product to keep birds from flying into your windows:
http://www.bestnest.com/bestnest/RTProduct.asp?SKU=DY-WW-12
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