Category Archives: birds

birds, drunks

Drunken Birds?

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My sense of the absurd was grabbed and throttled today by reports of drunken birds falling from the sky down under. In particular, red-collared lorikeets seem to be eating something that leaves them too drunk to fly and/or stand. It is not like a red-collared lorikeet is that inconspicuous of a bird to begin with:

Red-collared Lorikeets
(Credit: Mitch Reardon)

Now picture these guys falling out of the sky and trees drunk. As the original report in the Australian Geographic Journal reports:

SEEMINGLY DRUNKEN AND HUNGOVER parrots are dropping out of the sky in the Northern Territory and experts are at a loss to explain why.

The red-collared lorikeets lose coordination and pass out after eating a mystery food, Lisa Hansen, of the Ark Animal Hospital at Palmerston, near Darwin said on Thursday. Red-collared lorikeets are an NT subspecies of the rainbow lorikeet (Trichoglossus rubritorquis).

“It happens every year around this season, they lose all balance and we find them fallen out of trees and the sky,” she says. “Unless someone intervenes, they can’t fly and will get picked up by predators.”

Read more: http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/journal/drunken-parrots-falling-from-sky.htm#ixzz0pwQbWM7r

I can’t wait until the crows and robins around here learn which plant leads to intoxication. Think of it – hundreds of crows and robins crashing to the ground all around. The cats would be in seventh heaven. (Unless they decide to hit the catnip instead.)

Drunken birds do happen every once in a blue moon around here when berries ferment on the bushes and the birds imbibe, but it usually isn’t to the point they cannot stand up – it just makes them fly a little funny and poop a lot.

Are your birds hitting the sauce as summer begins (actually winter down under)?

birds, misc

The Birds Have It and Other Wars

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This morning I was awoken from a peaceful slumber by the sound a a raging bird war going on in the bush outside my bedroom window. A chickadee and some wrens were having a knock down dragout with stereo chirps and tweets and screetches. Once I figured out that:

a) I hadn’t died and gotten a bad harp translator in heaven,
b) I hadn’t somehow set the alarm to play really hideous music, and
c) it was turning light outside,

I was able to focus enough to read the alarm clock an spot that it was 5am. Given that I get up at 6am so I can walk down to the radio station on Wednesday mornings, I decided to bag the idea of geting back to sleep and instead get some reading done. I have paid for that decision all day now. It seems like I am tired but not quite sleepy. Oh well.

Last night was an interesting special meeting of the city council. A historic first meeting no less, with the city council, the county commissioners, and the rural fire district board all sitting in official session together to go over the proposed intergovernmental agreement (IGA) for the formation of the emergency services authority. Once the smoke cleared and the attorneys for all sides had thrown up their hnds in disgust, there was general agreement as to the form of the IGA. So the modified and corrected version will come before the city council for a first reading next Tuesday (and a second reading and public hearing a few weeks later if it passes the first reading) with similar time frames for approval by the other two entities. Thenthe ballot questions can be put on the ballot and see what the voters want.

The interesting part is that although the city and county have sat in joint session a couple of times during my tenure as mayor, this was the first tri-party meeting anyone can recall. It was also interesting since we filled the council chambers, which is rare. Pretty much, we had a standing room only size crowd. The last time we had that many people in attendance was when there was a proposed liquor license near the college which the churches opposed. I sure wish we could get that many interested citizens for the normal day-to-day business of running the city.

In other news, a good friend of L and I underwent spinal surgery today and I have received word that it went well and has relieved the pressure on his spine. So please think good thoughs for T during his healing and recovery.

birds, MIL

The Bird and the Mother-In-Law

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I was over at L’s Mom’s house this morning. As I took my leave, she was standing in the open doorway talking to me. At that time, a bird decided that it would like a tour of the house and nose dived past MIL and into the house. Needless to say, I got recruited for bird chasing and removal duty.

The bird flew to and fro and finally came to rest in the living room behind the knick-knack tower in the corner. It looked to be an adolescent crow. It certainly had little fear of humans as it sat there daring me to make it move. After a few desultory hand waves and some calming words, the bird finally decided a change of venue was in order and flew across the dining room table to the desk on the other wall. After calmly walking across the papers there, it took a moment to sit on the top of the letter opener.

This time when I finally convinced it to move on, it flew into the kitchen and hopped up on the kitchen counter. After performing a strut along the counter, it then tried the lids to all the cannisters to see if they would open. When that failed, he hopped up on the cooking utensils sitting in the wooden jar on the counter. There are few things funnier that a crow giving you a quizzical look while perched on the edge of a spatula.

Finally tiring of the kitchen, the young intruder returned to the living room and perched on the wall tapestry, looking much like a wood pecker. Then he dropped off and flew over to perch on the magazine rack. At this point, the MIL and I figured the game was up. He was sitting at the juncture of one arm of a T shaped hall, with one of the arms leading to the now propped open door he had entered. I took one arm of the T and MIL the other and we crowded the bird on out the door, which we immediately closed.

What made the whole thing extraordinary was how little fear of humans the bird showed. Even after being chased out of the house, he proceeded to stay a few feet from me as I started walking home. Makes me suspect someone has been working on taming the young crow as a pet.. Crows are among the most intelligent and resourceful birds around and are known to form relationships with people, so I hope the bird finds his way back to his person.

Time to head for the sack. Goodnight.and don’t let the birds get you.

birds, weather

The Birds

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Today we had another late in the day weather change from sunny to thunderstorms and windy, marking the onset of some cooler weather. It is only supposed to get to 60 or so tomorrow. Oh well, summer can wait.

One of the curiosities that has always made me scratch my head is the way birds like to settle on telephone wires before a storm arrives. It is not uncommon to see 10 or more between a couple of utility poles, just sitting there very quietly as the storm builds and approaches. Many times, the silent sitting birds are the first warning of an impending storm. Then the sky begins to darken and the clouds begin to explode into thunderheads and the lightning begins to flash. And if we are lucky out here, it also rains.

Now if I were a bird, I can’t picture why I’d go out and sit on a high wire with no cover if I thought it was going storm. Why sit on a high, wet wire in a rain and lightning storm? But the birds do it. I’ve always wondered how hard it is to stay anchored by a pair of slick claws to a smooth and possibly wet sheath of insulation. I think I’d be cramped up tight after hanging on for the 45 minutes it takes for the wind and the lightning to pass. And you notice that you never see one of the birds hanging on to the wire upside down. That tells me they must have one heck of a grip on the wire.

So today as the thunderstorm brewed and I headed over to do XXX’s therapy, I pondered the birds sitting on the phone wires and what a strange life it must be. I know that sometimes the wind becomes too much for the birds: they are the ones found dead on the ground after the storm. I also know that just as soon as the wind has calmed a bit, they are off and flying around. The robins are on the ground trying to catch the earthworms forced to the surface by the sudden downpour of water. The crows head off to scrounge for their favorite foods. And I am left to wonder how and why they do it.