Feeding The Birds

“ Feeding the birds is also a form of prayer” Pope Pius XII

Birds can fly, birds can travel, birds can sing, and they just seem so happy with their lot, be they swan or wren, sparrow or kite ... masters in the art of life, the art of now, though every moment of their entire lives is fraught with hazard and uncertainty.

Feeding the birds has always been an act of joyous exchange with a species so utterly different to our own. In days gone by, a spontaneous arrangement, when they just dropped by to share our spare. But over the years, it has developed into a kind of contract - an interdependency, even. Retirement has given me more time at home to observe and familiarise with my avian neighbours, and to ponder on their ways of being. The same is true in reverse, as they study my daily patterns, not just outside in the garden, but also through the garden windows. For I am now a significant provider. A couple of old rooks and a solitary gull even seem to know my car, and often observe me when I walk around in the village. I know them by their distinctive greetings and scruffy plumage.

These days I feed the small birds regularly from a tree close to the conservatory where I can watch them, and where the larger birds (who are fed on the garden wall) are too wary to encroach. My favourite daily visitation to the feeders is from a glorious and excitable troop of long-tailed tits who inhabit a dense thicket on the riverbank.

After 150million magnificent years of steady selective evolution, the world bird populations are now in stark decline, largely on account of man having stepped on the accelerator too hard in his quest for immediate gratification. This would include the three billion dollar annual industry in growing and distributing garden bird food. On the plus side, this enables wildlife lovers to help boost the health and population of their local beloveds, and to thereby redress our guilt. But we need to be aware that the feeding practice also has its downsides, in that it is slowly influencing and reshaping ecosystems, affecting the choice of nesting sites, even to the point that some birds are now reconsidering their migratory urges. Meanwhile, predators are also reviewing their territories.

I recently had to take my responsibilities into account, when I noticed a large rat was hanging around for feeder fallout. I realised that he had taken over the holes in the wall that had been long occupied by a healthy dynasty of wrens, whose absence I had noted. Appearing regularly in broad daylight, the new resident was too bold & insolent for comfort. I was reminded that David Attenborough, when asked if there was any animal on earth that he disliked, admitted to a hatred of rats. When asked which he feared most, he nominated a ‘drunk man’, closely followed by a King Cobra.

On this particular morning, stood at the conservatory door with a coffee, I was wondering what to do about Ratty. Poison was not an option as it gets into the food-chain, and traps have to be used with due caution and cunning. As I pondered, he emerged from the undergrowth, just two feet from where I stood behind the glass, as if to challenge me. Suddenly, just as he noticed me, there was a huge fluttery shadow, as a young buzzard descended on Ratto and a lengthy battle ensued - at my feet! I doubt I’ve ever stood so still for so long in my life, my coffee stone cold by the time I dared raise it to my mouth. I gawped at the mighty magnificence of the size and tones in the bird’s wings, as they beat against the glass, his strong yellow reptilian legs armed with huge black claws that clasped tight around the rat’s throat. Ratty squealed and squirmed, his yellow teeth bared for the opportunity to bite, as the buzzard, ‘shackled’ by his own grip, hobbled a couple of feet to the relative privacy of an overhanging shrub, to negotiate a targeted death strike. For a moment, the squeaking subsided, as the buzzard looked up in what could only be construed as amazement, my old cat Ziggy having just mooched round the corner of the house straight into the tiny arena of this extraordinary drama. Now there were three of us in the long freeze of a staring match. The cat’s eyes expanded to saucers; the buzzard’s golden eyes glowed menacingly behind his massive yellow and black curved beak, his wings arched high over and around his prey, who squirmed miserably. I held my breath until I thought I might explode, and Ziggy finally acknowledged that the handsome giant robin (easily twice his size) was best left to his business. Usually so essentially feline, he awkwardly sidled off, knocking over a sizeable flowerpot, until reaching the open plains of the lawn, where he fled like a rabbit. Meanwhile still at my feet, Bob the buzzard returned to the process of carefully butchering his brunch - not a scene I care to dwell on. I thanked him humbly for solving my problem.

Birds - masters in the art of life for 150million years …

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