Subject: birds aren't people
Date: Jun 6 17:59:42 1999
From: Netta Smith - netta at jps.net


Hi tweeters,

Instead of being out birding as I should be (right?), I'm in my usual
place at my computer, but as always I keep one eye on the screen and the
other out the window into my back yard. I just observed some bird
behavior that made me think. We have a supposedly starling-proof suet
feeder in the yard, a cage that chickadees and nuthatches can enter and
woodpeckers can hang underneath. Well, it didn't take the starlings more
than one visit to figure out how to hang beneath it like a woodpecker.
But that's not the interesting behavior.

One starling was busily scarfing beaksful of suet while hanging
upside-down, and its single young was begging constantly from the top of
the feeder, not having figured out how to exploit it. Every few seconds
the young bird would fly underneath it, presumably to get in on the
action, and knock the adult off! The adult would fall/flutter to the
ground, the begging young following it with no response, the adult would
fly up to the feeder again, and the whole ridiculous act (made me laugh
out loud) would happen again. This happened a half dozen times in a row,
each time the adult getting some suet before it got knocked off, then
they suddenly flew away.

What was so amazing was the adult's complete equanimity in the face of
this constant disturbance. Can you imagine having a baby that--if you
didn't feed it immediately--would knock you out of your chair? There
would be a shriek, perhaps a string of four-letter words, quick
discipline, and general malaise (especially on the second occurrence!).
To the bird it seemed to be inconsequential, all in a day's work.
Although it's always tempting to personify them, birds aren't little
people with feathers. They're not even equivalent to mammals; I suspect
most parent mammals would have disciplined that unruly youngster. Birds
are optimizers; they go about their intended business as long as they're
able.

On another note, look closely at the juvenile starlings appearing like a
plague. They vary amazingly in color, most of them light to medium brown
but a small percentage very dark gray, not much lighter than the adults.
We have one of these in the museum, and it's quite striking; just this
week I saw several like it on the UPS campus in Tacoma. Is this a
mutation that's increasing?

On a note of higher biodiversity, there has been an Olive-sided
Flycatcher and a Western Wood-Pewee around the yard for a week or more
now, acting as if they'd like to breed here, but I'm not sure either one
has a mate. It's wonderful to be able to compare them, and I've seen
them perched no more than 10 feet apart a few times. The Olive-sided
chases the pewee every once in a while. The OSFL almost always perches
higher, on the highest dead maple branches and often flies way up above
the canopy, while the WEWP perches on exposed but lower branches and
keeps below the level of the highest trees on its sallies, even though
usually in the open. Neither is "singing," perhaps both females.

I guess the last migrant is gone, a female Wilson's Warbler that I last
saw two days ago.

Dennis Paulson

Netta Smith and Dennis Paulson
1724 NE 98 St.
Seattle, WA 98115
(206) 528-1382