Birds bringing gifts
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It all started two years ago, when Gabi began feeding local flocks of crows. At first it was haphazard—a dropped chicken nugget here, a crumb from a sandwich there. But the crows took notice, and soon enough Gabi’s hospitality went from being accidental to intentional. These days, Gabi’s crows perch nearby whenever she’s outside, hoping for a feast or even just a morsel. But the spirit of giving inhabits both the girl and the beast. Soon enough, the crows were showering Gabi with all sorts of loot.
Every day, Gabi leaves out food (mostly peanuts, which are a big hit) in the backyard for her groupies. In return, they leave her gifts—shiny baubles like polished sea-glass, and odder trinkets, like a rusty screw or tube of chapstick. In what could have been a coincidence or a lovely curiosity, the crows promptly returned a lens cap that Gabi had lost while taking some photographs (of a bird, naturally) in an alleyway. And so the plot thickened.
Crows, and all other members of the corvid family (which also includes jays, magpies, and ravens), are renowned for their intelligence. They’re known to be prodigious tool-users, and are more adept with tools than all other animals short of the great apes. Even their social behavior mirrors ours in some ways; they’ve been observed performing funeral rites for their deceased members of their murder (it’s the name for a group of crows—not sinister at all!).
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That's lovely.
Sadly we are taking down our bird feeders today. There's an avian flu going around that is killing a lot of birds and it has reached Ohio. We can still feed the hummingbirds but everything else is a vector for spread. Thankfully food is plentiful in the summer for them.
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"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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@george-k
when that story came out (the one you posted) I was fascinated. But I feel for the neighbor too. Too many birds make a lot of mess, especially in a city. My neighbor across the street had to complain to the city, the guy behind her was feeding the pigeons, dumping piles of birdseed in his yard and they were all roosting on her roof and deck and fences. -
@jodi said in Birds bringing gifts:
@george-k
when that story came out (the one you posted) I was fascinated. But I feel for the neighbor too. Too many birds make a lot of mess, especially in a city. My neighbor across the street had to complain to the city, the guy behind her was feeding the pigeons, dumping piles of birdseed in his yard and they were all roosting on her roof and deck and fences.I'm taking notes.
