Playing Bird God

Sunday October 7 2018

Oh, $hit - I'm outside in the dark, holding a rescued squealing woodpecker in my hands, with 3 ninja kitties climbing up my legs and two screech owls waiting in a tree - NOW what am I supposed to do!?

Dark outside, and I hear some high pitched squealing of an animal in distress. I leap out the door, afraid it's one of the ninja kittens in trouble, but no, it's not a cat. Rabbit? Bird? Has to be a bird. I grab a headlamp and track down the high-pitched squealing. 

Or rather track it up - there it is - a screech owl has some kind of bird in its claw up in a cottonwood tree.

And that's when I should have turned and walked away.

But I can't walk away. I have the screech owl in my headlamp, and I watch him. The prey-bird squeals very loudly and flaps, but it's pinned in the grip of the owl's talons… while below around my feet the 3 ninja kittens swarm around frantically, looking up, trying to track down the noise which is obviously an animal worthy of cat claws and jaws.

And the screech owl flies away with his prize... but the flapping bird flaps loose and flutters to the ground. The ninja kittens are on it instantly. I am on the kittens the next instantly. I grab the bird, which turns out to be a Downy woodpecker. 

As I gently cradle the bird, it grips my fingers tightly. Any time I speak, Easy birdie, it squeaks, loudly. Oooh, shut up bird! (They can be very loud.) The kittens are trying to crawl up my legs. (Me: "Ouch! Stop it!") (Downy: Shriek!) (Ninja kitties: "Meow!") I look up in the trees, and 4 screech owl eyeballs are staring down at me silently, reflecting my headlamp.

Now what do I do??? I should have left it to Mother Nature. Not my business to interfere. Mother Nature already had this all figured out before I stuck my human two cents in. The woodpecker may die anyway, and the screech owls will be out a meal. What if the screech owls die because of this meal I cheated them out of? What if all 3 birds die because of my interference? If I put the woodpecker back in a tree near the owls, am I sacrificing the woodpecker? Is it my decision to kill the woodpecker? I can't set the bird down anywhere anyway, because the cats will get it. The kittens are great mousers, but I don't want to encourage them as being great birders, too.

I have finally stopped talking, and the woodpecker is silent, but even though I open my hand, it's gripping my fingers tightly. Its heartbeat is slowing down from its adrenaline rush, but it's strong. I'm able to look at it in my headlamp, and it doesn't look torn up at all. The owls are still watching. The kittens are still prowling around my feet. I'm holding the bird out in my open palm, where it sits calmly while I'm still trying to decide what to do.

The kittens are still trying to crawl up my legs. I lead them to the house, entice them inside, and shut the door on them… and decide to head to some different trees away from the screech owls, to try to put the woodpecker on a branch.

Not 10 seconds later the ninja kittens are following me, having found a window through which they escaped back outside. They don't know I still carry the bird since it's silent now, but they always follow me hopefully around anyway.

As I try to set the woodpecker on a thick tree branch, it's still gripping my fingers tightly… and when I try to gently turn my hand so it steps onto the tree branch, it squeals again. Shut up! I whisper, Hurry!, and as he fumbles and stumbles onto the branch, one of the ninjas is up in the tree immediately.

In my headlamp, the woodpecker squeals again… but it sees the cat and in desperation flaps away, and the last I see of it is wings flapping upward out of my headlamp, as Ninja Silvester shoots after it across the grass, but he pulls up empty-clawed.

The woodpecker's gone into the dark. It may live; it might not. Cats are empty-pawed, and the screech owls are empty-taloned. 

And I'm left feeling discombobulated. I don't like playing Bird God because I don't know if I made the right decision and I should have left it alone.

Those Little Flycatchers: Say's Phoebes

Friday June 26 2015

It's a productive year in Owyhee for Say's Phoebes. A pair nested on top of the porch light on the front porch, right by the front door - the busy front door with constant traffic from people, cats and dogs. The birds like protective ceilings for their nest more than they dislike close proximity to people.

The Phoebe babies were spilling out of their nest April 25, and not even the people-busy Tough Sucker endurance ride, nor the evening Teeterville Jam (2 banjos, 2 guitars, 1 fiddle) on the front porch interfered with all 4 babies fledging soon afterwards.

It was such a good year in Owyhee, the Phoebes double-brooded.

June 15, four new ones were piled in the same nest, fuzzy and hot in the heat.


Thursday, June 25, spilling out of their nest, at least 2 of them fledged.  I happened to see the first one fly out of the nest into the nearest tree.


I then saw a second one fledge, onto a deer antler hanging off the lattice of the front porch. Maw and Paw Phoebe hung out with him, kept an eye on him.


I sat still and quiet for an hour, watching, taking pictures. My arms and legs cramped, my hands went to sleep, but it paid off waiting and watching, when Maw or Paw brought him a bug! That's the top photo.

The remaining two babies weren't quite ready to leave the nest, and they kept hoping for one more bug to eat.


This rather drab-colored flycatcher has a distinctive and plaintive "Peeer" call. They eat insects by nabbing them in flight, or by hovering over them and snatching them off the ground. They may winter in the Southwest and as far south as central Mexico, and they migrate north in early spring, nesting as far north as northern Alaska.

The size difference between the parents and offspring isn't that great… except for the Big Mouths on the babies!

Don't they look dejected that no food is forthcoming?

I'm a Raven and Bird of Prey fanatic, but these Say's Phoebes are intriguing, and what a treat, getting to see these little birds from the second brood fledge!

Friends in High Places

Thursday April 9 2015

A short jog up Bates Crick, a pair of Ravens brood on their nest. I'm sure it's the same pair that raised 4-5 young in the same nest last year. Their young turned into rowdy raucous ruckus-raisin' gang-bangin' kestrel teasers.

The adult Ravens don't mind me getting close, particularly the male, and I'm almost certain he's The Raven I saved a couple of years ago (story still coming!). One of them will come strut about the horse pasture out front in the mornings, picking up goodies, and dodging wispy Audrey the Terrorist cat who thinks she can assassinate an adult Raven.


A half mile or so up Pickett Crick, the Great Horned Owl brood has already hatched. This year the owls took over last year's Red-Tailed Hawk nest - much to the angst of the hawks. Owls nest earlier, so they get first choice - in this case a nice protected nest that the red tails were hoping to claim again this year. I can see one owlet on the nest, though they usually lay 2-3 eggs. The adult on the nest is the top photo. This is the owlet - he looks cute-ugly fluffy-fierce at the same time.


Just 50 yards upstream from the owls are the red tails, in the second choice nest. I can only imagine it rankles, losing your home to your enemies. Here you can just see the female's head to the left, and her tail to the right, sitting low on her nest.


Again the kestrels have mixed in with this mob - they're noisy and obnoxious, and certainly don't like their neighbors, particularly when an owl is sitting in their nest tree. But they decided to re-settle in this racially charged neighborhood anyway.

And then there are the golden eagles. The Bates Crick pair hardly made appearances this winter. In the previous 3 years, I'd see them on the ridge above their nest in December and January and February, and occasionally fluffing up their nest before starting to incubate in March or so. They raised young in 2 of the last 4 years. Not this year. Last time anybody saw them was in January. And they don't have another nest in this territory (eagles often have several nests within their territory, and they often switch around every year). They just disappeared.


Then there's Hart Crick. I've hiked around here in previous years, once discovering a bunch of eagle nests on one of the cliff faces. Never seen an eagle on any of them - till this year, when I carelessly startled one. I climbed up to the edge of the cliffs here, counted some 4-5 old eagle nests, and admired the view. About to climb back down, I hiked around one more cliff and popped over the edge - and did a startled double take as the golden eagle below me did a startled double take up at me - and flew off nest where she was brooding an egg.

Damn! I didn't mean to scare her off her nest, and had I known she was down there, I'd have never approached so close. Rookie mistake! I quickly retreated as fast as I could, away from the edge and down the far side of the cliff.

It's awesome to have such cool friends in high places - I just hope the eagles and I are still friends!

Keeper of Souls

Tuesday February 26 2013

The white floor of the narrow valley glows ghostly white from the full moon hidden behind the clouds. Snow sifts lightly to the earth, powdering the pines needles, dusting my feet like the forest floor, caressing my hair, brushing my upturned face gently before leaving its cold kiss. The snowflakes are as a mist on the distant luminescent hills.

I sharpen my ears and summon an archaic language and call into the night. The sound reflects off the side mountain, echoes down the valley, rolling through the peculiar muffled silence of falling snow. And in the fold of forest between the hills, a barred owl answers, first distant, then closer:

Who who who-who who-who-who whoooooo.

We converse a while, he and I, his eerie sonorous articulations bearing the gift of contact with another world we seldom get to share.

He is a seer of souls: perhaps he is guarding the spirits of the dead who have tramped these forests and mountains. Perhaps he is hinting at the sacred knowledge he keeps.

Perhaps we are sharing consciousness, an unenlightened, unworldly human and an otherworldly, wise owl, ruler of the night.

Six Rowdy Ravens

Wednesday August 17 2011

The juvenile gang showed up a couple of weeks ago out of the blue: six bold, raucous, rowdy young Ravens perching in a dead tree one evening, surveying their new turf.

Where did they come from? Are they all from the same area? Are they from the same nest? Did they happen upon each other and something made them decide to stick together? Did they recognize the intrepid kinship in each other? Did they recognize that the voices and presence of six are much more intimidating than one?

They're like rambunctious teenagers, punk hats sideways on their heads, pants down below their knees - they swagger, they strut about; they shriek, they yell; there's nothing subtle about them - and why should there be? At this age, they know everything and they let the world know they know everything.


Delightfully irreverent, every morning they wake the dead (and the living) before dawn, hollering at the universe to look out because they're coming.

They set off roaming, terrorizing the neighborhood, bullying little birds, eluding enraged kestrals, daringly dodging disturbed dogs. They satisfy their hunger by persecuting worms and bugs, harvesting seeds from grass stalks, plucking at dead things.

They experiment and play - any toy will do. One Raven breaks a tiny stick off a tree;



another hops close to try and take it; another Raven breaks off his own stick and plays with it

till the first Raven drops his

and hops over to try and take the other Raven's stick.

I walk beneath their tree every evening before they fall asleep, tossing out dog food nibbles. Do they eat it in the morning? I don't know, but they watch me. They are imperiously untouchable. One morning they left behind a huge feather for me as a token of their illustrious Ravenness.


They are acrobats in the air

chasing each other,

diving, tumbling, swooping, soaring, landing

and taking off and screaming their encouragement to each other.

On a sudden whim, they all scatter, shooting across the sky, strewing like sun rays; they reconvene as one to a tree to discuss things, shouting opinions, yelling thoughts, rawking discoveries, muttering comments, murmuring secrets, burbling stories, knocking their magnificence.

They scuffle, they argue;



they say sweet things, they cuddle.


They entertain. They delight.

They bring great luck with their presence, these six rowdy Ravens.


*Worth noting: I borrowed part of my title from Evon Zerbetz's marvelous illustrated book Ten Rowdy Ravens. She also illustrated Dog Days, Raven Nights, by John and Colleen Marzluff, which I'm reading now.

Can't Move

Sunday December 19 2010

Says Jose... I have a Magpie on my head.

Birdiful II

Thursday March 25 2010

Today I was able to ditch the dogs, and I snuck up Bates Creek from the house.

I knew where I should find a long-eared owl or two (last May, I found several, including a baby), so I slowly and as quietly as possible approached the spot in the creek where the brush is thickest and where I know they hang out.

I looked, and looked, stopped and studied the brush and tree branches every few yards, but didn't see one. You won't see a long-eared owl unless you flush one, or unless you are really, really good. They are so camouflaged and look so like the tree or brush they are sitting in, and since they won't move or blink, your eyes simply won't comprehend one.

I walked very slowly upstream along the bank - no owls. I was sure there had to be owls in here. I slowly walked back downstream along the bank, and still saw nothing. Just as I was about to give up, I noticed a pile of whitewash under some brush. Ah ha - an owl had obviously been sitting there for a time. I kept looking at the brush - and realized I'd been staring at the long-eared owl the whole time! Quite unbelievable. (Looks obvious in the photo, but it wasn't!)

He didn't move, didn't blink, just stared at me. I was quite sure there had to be more owls around there, and very possibly one on a nest, but I could not see an obvious nest (there was a possibility, but I was pretty sure nothing was on it) and didn't want to disturb him or them any more.

I continued on upstream, and not 30 yards further I spotted a small nest in the crook of a snag and - also camouflaged so well I would not have made it out if the wind hadn't been blowing its ears - sitting on it, a great horned owl!




The other thing that gave it away was the partner great horned owl that flushed out of the tree next to it. He flew upstream and immediately came right back with two Ravens chasing it! One Raven landed close and was knocking (vocally) at the owl; the owl was snapping his beak at the Raven, which they do when they are threatened.


I left them all alone to have their row, and continued upstream another quarter mile to two more empty nests. Was one of these a Raven nest? I'd seen a Raven flying in this direction last week with sticks in its feet.


Under one of the nests I found some fairly fresh whitewash and a broken pellet. I think the nest was unoccupied at the moment. Maybe Ravens nest a bit later in the spring, or, maybe this Raven pair (or another) are just toying with nest-building but decided to stay childless another year.

Getting tired of the bird posts yet? Hope not, because while I'm done with Bates Creek, I'm not done with the area yet!