A Guest Appearance
My teenage daughter, an avid birder, reminisces about the first bird she identified as a five year old child. Reading these words made me very happy that I homeschool my children and I thought I would share them with you.
And now...here's Ponytail:
Generally, problems or quirks in people are blamed on their parents. They do this because the embarrassment is lighter when it’s somebody else’s fault. But,of course –- sometimes it’s not the parent’s fault -- and then, sometimes it is. So it is with this tale – the tale of a birder.It was through the beneficence of my
wonderful parents or, in other words, it was their fault.
They bought a bird feeder.
But, oh! how glad I am that they buy that feeder. I would have missed some of my
most exciting and joyous (not to say moving) moments in my life. So, this feeder
was a suet feeder. It was the kind that holds a delectable cake of fat and nuts
that birds will die for. It is their version of a super sundae drowned with caramel and chocolate sauce, festooned with peanuts, crowned with a banana and enveloped in whipped cream. (M&Ms? .... Don't mind if I do!)We hung the feeder in a convenient clump of cedar trees within sight of a window. I watched that feeder like a hawk. (No pun intended; though Cooper’s Hawks do stalk feeders.) Nothing passed the window without my skittering over to check it out. As you can imagine, I did a lot of skittering; ‘nothing’ included flies. But for two agonizingly long days, nothing came. The feeder hung, inviting but alone,
swaying slightly in a gentle breeze.But at last, something visited. And luckily it was not a squirrel.It was a small bird, with a white tummy and checkered back and a dashing red skullcap. It was handsome – at least in my eyes. But what was it? What was its name? That age-old birding question filled my brain.Pinning the right I.D. on the right bird can drive you crazy. (There speaks a birder who has braved her first warbler season. At least my Life List was happy.) So I got out a huge volume on birds. It had a grayish cover and was very heavy. Daddy helped me. As soon as it was laid on the table I was thumbing through the pages, looking for a black and white bird with a red cap. I looked through the thing a long time. I found a little gray bird with a perky tuft on the top of his head, but no red or black. This was a Tufted Titmouse, not the bird I’d seen. I went
doggedly on.At last, disgruntled, I handed the book over to Mom. WHERE was the little thing?? But if I couldn’t find it, Mom could. I had (make that ‘have’) a great respect for her knack of finding things right under my nose. I waited, breathless with excitement. What was it going to turn out to be?I repeated my description of the bird to Mom, and looking through the book Mom found a bird like it. It was called a Downy Woodpecker, and there was another one called a Hairy Woodpecker and they were very similar. Hairys are just a bit bigger. So the bird I had seen had probably been a Downy Woodpecker.
But a supposed I.D. is almost as bad as none at all.This mystery was cleared up a few weeks later. We went to an Audubon center. If you have not been to one, there is no excuse for you. You must go to one! So, at this Audubon there was another suet feeder. And my bird was eating at one of them. The excitement level was high. Mom asked the lady at the counter what bird that was.
“A Downy Woodpecker,” was the answer.
My first bird. And I got the I.D. right.
Labels:
Homeschooling,
Nature Study
