Common Birds I
I want to help keep common birds common. I read a book a few weeks ago called the Peregrine. It was written in the 60s as a eulogy for peregrines. At the time their population was sharply decreasing due to human development and pesticides. To me, however, the book read more as a eulogy for the vast number of birds the author took for granted. In his search throughout the English coast for peregrines, the author routinely saw thousands of starlings, thousands of wood pigeons, and thousands of wader-birds. Since the 60s, we’ve collectively done a fairly good job of restoring many charismatic species like peregrines and bald eagles. But I live in one of the best places in America for shore birds and gulls and if I see ten at once that’s a lot. I can’t imagine ever seeing 5,000 plovers flying overhead, especially not with the nonchalance of the author of the Peregrine. At the same time, I’m sure he couldn’t imagine the raptors rebounding either.
I
I work in a business park north of Andover, Massachusetts, right off of the Merrimack River and I-93. There are several small streams and cattail marshes that remain intact between the black pavement. In even a small space, there is wildness.
It’s the first Monday after switching to daylight-savings-time, so my walk is earlier than normal as far as everything but humans are concerned. The mouth of the small trail which leads to the Merrimack is filled with birds. About a half a dozen robins forage in the old leaves, alongside white-throated sparrows and dark-eyed juncos. I hear sharp claws scuffling along bark, just to my right above my head. My eyes follow my ears and I see a downy woodpecker inching his way down a branch. A brilliantly red cardinal, a bluejay, and a tiny Carolina wren flit from tree to tree as I approach. I imagine they’re walking with me, and not terrified. The Carolina wren reminds me of my mom, and of her mom, my Mamaw. Mamaw lived in rural, Eastern Kentucky for most of her life, and loved birds for all of it. My mom is there, in Kentucky, now, helping with the long processes of recovering from the floods. Just over a year ago, all three of us were there, as Mamaw lay dying and we watched the birds through her window.
There’s a small sort of pond here, where the stream meets the river. The stream broadens and then is pinched off so a small footbridge can cross the mouth. The pond is still most days, including today. The last of the ice has melted. Usually, there are mallards and hooded mergansers here, but not today. Walking back towards my office, I hug the edge of the stream. I’ve been watching a great blue heron for the last few months. He lives in this meandering part of the stream, mostly hidden by trees and brush. I don’t think anyone else in the office park knows the heron lives there, but he stayed over the winter. Heron’s usually migrate south, but this one stayed. Perhaps because the winter was mild, but perhaps because he loves it here. He passed the winter by all appearances unhappily, hunched and cold, but now that spring is coming on, he’s more active, wading through all of the bends. I now see him basically every day. I think of him as a coworker. We see each other more than most of my human coworkers. As I approach the gap where I can clearly see the stream I hear red-winged blackbirds, chickadees, and a calling nuthatch (a happy nuthatch) in the trees and rushes. At the gap I see the heron, and then striding through the low water a second heron comes into view and ah! I am overjoyed. It’s hard to tell the gender of a heron, but I hope they can be a breeding pair, and they live and love in this little stream and raise little baby herons who toddle around on their abundantly lanky legs and three years from now, grown and vigilant fisherfolk, live in this same winding stream.
