Two Old Birds Battle It Out

With the absence of our white cat, the bird population has decided that the run-in rafters are an excellent site for avian condominiums. The woman is determined to evict them and I just stand and watch the show.

The birds, the black kind that seem to number in the millions, carry various twiggy building materials in and arrange them on a rafter. The woman rushes out and says "Gahhhhshooossssttttt" and the birds say"Ackkkeeeepbleee". Then the woman fetches the broom and waits till they return and they repeat the process. Then she gets the hose and blasts the twigs out the door. Then all the soggy stuff left up there falls on her person, causing more sound effects and some rather questionable language. Highly amusing except she then says "Sheaffer, why can't you just chase those things out of here?!" Do I look like some sort of security guard or bird bouncer? I mean, really, there are limits.

At our last place we had several families of avians called Swallows who built mud nests all over the barn. She must have liked those better, because she let them stay. I was very careful with the offspring when they were learning to fly and never hurt one, only gently huffed on them when they landed in my stall. When the second or third batch of the summer were ready, they gathered in huge groups and discussed their flight plan back down south. Then I had to keep my ears low going in the door or risk a nasty collision.

One spring a lone male Swallow appeared and landed on the wire right above the crossties while the woman was grooming Doc. She welcomed him back and he sat there, within arm's reach, chattering away in bird-speak while grooming his glossy feathers. We were all wondering where the "missus" was when she flew in and there was a touching reunion of the couple. Then she went to inspect the nest and flew into a fury. It seems he was sent on ahead to "open up the cottage" and all he'd done was loll about and visit. Well! He began frantically cleaning the nest and bringing in new material while she sat at the side and continued to express her thoughts about handsome males who think they don't have to help out on the home front. He carried on till long after dark, when she finally let him sit on the ledge next to her, but she kept her back firmly turned to him. He worked hard till the first batch arrived and then got distracted with teaching them to fly and playing games with them and at that point she gave up and raised batch two without much help. The humans quite enjoyed the pagent and declared him a case of "arrested development".

I await new developments in our rafters. So far it's a draw.