My Garden Jungle

There’s a bright cardinal knocking on my window. I’m sitting less than three feet from him; still he bangs away. He’s been at this drumming for about a week now, and I’m both sick of his antics and intrigued by his persistence.

Thirty or more years ago, this fellow’s great grandfather used to tap away each day in similar fashion at another of my houses just up the road from here. I began to think that he was trying to call me, and I’d rush madly to our nearby feeder with a fresh supply of sunflower seeds. There seemed almost to be a direct correlation between the tapping and feeding, but I found out from fellow birders that he was simply challenging his image in the looking glass. No Pavlovian response here, at least by the bird. Brilliant Bill!

Last year we installed new windows in this house that are far more reflective than most, and now I have a daily show by this bird brain demonstrating to his image just who’s boss in this territory. At this moment he’s perched in a nandina bush about six inches from the glass. I rose from my chair and only when I got within a foot from the window did he sense my presence and hop to another nearby bush waiting for his buddy to appear again. Never have I been so close to a wild animal without startling it.

One winter – again about a generation ago – a mocking bird took up residence in a small pear tree on the sidewalk strip in front of my house. Emerging each morning to await my carpool, I would strike up a conversation with this very tough little fellow. We got so we’d shout back and forth from a distance of about five or six feet. This time I was even more certain that I’d struck up interspecies communication and only gave up on the idea when I saw that he was just defending the tiny fruit from other feathered friends and probably from humans fools like me walking too close by. Brilliant Bill!

On more than one occasion, flocks of starlings descended on the pear tree, but even fifty or more of these tough, aggressive and nasty little beasts had to back down in the face of the screaming and enraged little mocker. All of this took place in the winter, and as with those ancient events, I thought it strange that my new cardinal resident was becoming as aggressive as we head for the colder weather. Strictly counter intuitive as far as I was concerned, as I thought they’d defend territories only in breeding season, forgetting they have to eat. Brilliant Bill!

Last week, I opened the door to my patio and a middling sized Black Rat Snake exploded in panic. My trash barrel stands just to the left of the entrance, and I was startled by the gong as the poor beast banged its head in a panic on the empty plastic container drum. He froze and recovered to quickly coil for a strike as I emerged. Not to worry, he was a good four feet long and twice as thick as my thumb, so it had little to fear from me, the fraidie cat of the neighborhood. After a moment to collect wits and dignity, it slithered slowly away under my fence.

A couple of months ago, my wife took some great photos of a small garter snake trying make a living by moseying around the garden and sliding through some prostrate junipers that line the front of our largest bed. She’s petrified of snakes but was able to force herself to get very close and to compose some great shots.

Even tiny gardens are teeming with wildlife. Henry Thoreau would be pleased at our observations but perhaps not at my hasty conclusions.

Blog on!

Wild Bill