FreeLists / va-richmond-general / [va-richmond-general] A nice bird-feeding column from the Washington Post today

[<k-kreutzer@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

 Kathy Kreutzer, Chesterfield, VA
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10505-2004Feb3.html

washingtonpost.com
The Birdseed of Hope
If you offer it, they will come. Won't they?

By Significant Others

Sunday, February 8, 2004; Page W39


When I bought this birdseed, seven pounds of "Cardinal/Songbird Blend," I
expected a winter garden full of grosbeaks, buntings, chickadees, titmice,
juncos and jays, just as the bag advertised.

This was two weeks ago. I am currently, and still, birdless.

I know; it takes a while for birds to find your bird feeders. I remember
this from the last time I was in a bird feeder stage and I had a whole
cafeteria outside my home-office window. At my desk I kept binoculars and a
bird book so I could identify all those beauties stopping by to partake of
the bounty. It was exciting! I remember one woodpecker that would sometimes
peck at the window frame as if to say, "Lady, you mind refreshing this
hopper with some fresh sunflower mix?"

I would answer the woodpecker. I would say, "Look here, buddy," and tell it
to take note of the suet cake hanging off the birch tree, or some other
highlighted treat of the day. I would say these things out loud and without
shame.

The relationship you form with the birds outside your window says a lot
about what stage of life you are in. Somehow, as time marched on, I stopped
with the bird feeders. I moved my office upstairs, where I shut the blinds
so I could concentrate on work. Be efficient! Update that software for
serious multi-tasking! Time management became my goal, a worthwhile pursuit
by most of America's reckoning. How, after all, can you expect to be a
productive member of society if you're sitting around talking to woodpeckers
all day?

One morning recently I opened my newly upgraded MS Outlook 2003 task list to
find a directive to: "Put out the stinkin' bird feeders!" I didn't remember
adding that entry, but it sounded like something I might have. Or maybe
angels had done it? No, I'm quite certain the task was listed by my own
hand, probably on some lonely day last fall when I sat wondering about
winter, and snow, and how hungry the birds get.

You can go fast through life, or you can go slow. I think most of us just
yearn to master the controls.

It feels good to have bird feeders back. I put six outside my kitchen
window, so I could bird-watch while scrubbing pots. The first morning, I
awoke to find the bird feeders toppled, as if by some hostile act. I'd hung
them off those poles you use to hang geranium pots in summer; apparently the
mushy ground didn't provide a strong enough foundation. I tried again,
redistributing the weight. The next morning: on the ground. Well, no wonder
the birds weren't coming. "This place is a wreck," they were likely
thinking, or so I found myself imagining: birds out there gossiping about
the loon-lady who can't even figure out how to hang bird feeders.

It feels good to imagine nonsense again.

Friends were supportive when my new system of anchors and posts held the
bird feeders upright but still no birds came. "Maybe they come at night when
you're asleep," said one. "If I were a bird, I sure would come," said
another. "I think birds might like bread crumbs better than seeds," my
daughter offered.

I was a hostess all dolled up for the party, with all the party trays out,
and no guests.

All you need for the birds to show up is one bird. One bird to find the
food, and then chirp word back to its bird community. This, as I think about
it, is a lousy system, news traveling by word-of-beak. Birds need
advertising. Birds need a 24-hour news channel. HEY, BIRDS! WINTER GOT YOU
DOWN? HAVING TROUBLE FINDING FOOD? IT'S ALL OVER HERE, AND IT'S FREE!

After about a week of no birds, I went out and bought "Nut and Fruit Blend,"
intended for yellow-rumped warblers, bluebirds and mockingbirds. And
"Sunflower Seed Chips," for grackles, finches, towhees and wrens.

I scrubbed pots and waited, scrubbed pots and waited, received little more
than a renewed relationship with dishpan hands.

Standing here today with no more pots to scrub, I'm getting huffy. "The heck
with you, birds," I say, out loud and without shame. "You're the ones
missing out."

Just then a wren appears. A wren! The tiniest mouse of a bird. But a bona
fide bird pecking at the ground. I want to run out and scream my welcome,
jump up and down with joy. But I know better than to scare it. I say good
morning to the wren, ask it to please pass the news to the grosbeaks,
buntings, chickadees, titmice and jays.

Then I make calls. I send e-mails. "A wren!" "A wren!" "A wren!" I say, to
all the people who supported me during my birdless time.

"Yoohoo, wren?" I say, when I return to find it gone. "Wren?" Even so, it
feels good to be talking to the birds again, kind of like a return to
church.

Jeanne Marie Laskas's e-mail address is post@xxxxxxxxxxxxx




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