A Cunning Hunter

I was reading Jon Young’s book ‘What the Robin knows when I got to page 46, here Jon talked about his observations of a Coopers hawk bringing around 66 song birds to its chicks in the nest over the period of his sit-spot.

This reminded me of an experience a close friend of mine had at our nature reserve in Germany called the Zachariassee which I would like to share that with you.

One day while observing the birds at the Zach. Peter observed a Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) hunting juvenile Little Ringed Plovers (Charadrius dubius) 

The Kestrel sat on a fence post in the north eastern corner of the reserve. The fence ran alongside the water’s edge of this disused gravel pit. He watched as the Kestrel killed three young plovers in a very short space of time. Always, after the adults had given the 'all clear' and the immature birds started walking around again.

He slammed into them, each time the adults gave the call clear. The result was none of the young survived the Kestrels onslaught. It seems the Kestrel was able to convince the adults that he presented no threat to their young?

The Death of a California Quail

I am cooking dinner one night, when I hear the intense alarms of the California Quail, and I look outside the kitchen window to see one of our cats stalking across the driveway. A male quail is sitting on top of the gate alarming loudly, and a female is cornered against the fencing. Instinctively I scream and run like a banshee out the front door, just as the cat pounces and grabs the female quail.

Feathers explode into the air, and the cat scrambles into the drainage ditch, bird in mouth, and I jump after her, scaring her into dropping her catch, and the wounded quail escapes and flies into the plum, oak and bramble patch. The male quail flies after her, alarming frantically.I snatch the cat and lock her indoors, and then rush back to see the damage. Feathers are everywhere. Too many. Some are clumped with blood and there are tail and wing primaries. It doesn’t look good. I feel terrible.

At this point, most of the birds in the neighbourhood have come to rubberneck. The local raven family (2 adults and their 2 juveniles) swoop in from nowhere, cawing like crazy and flying in big excited circles right over my head. The Scrub Jay family arrives too, making an unbelievable racket. They seem upset but also interested in a possible easy quail meal.

I chase all of them away, flailing my arms and yelling: ”go away! there’s nothing to see here!” I’m the policeman at the scene of a bird crime. I’m glad they obey. I’m too upset to take any corvid nonsense.

I can hear the California Quail in the bushes. I reach out with my heart and mind, and speak softly to them, telling them how sorry I am that my cat did this. They are both alarmed and I don’t want to disturb them anymore, and so I offer my apology, and then stand still in silence, and listen.

And then I hear them. They stop alarming, and begin calling softly to each other, in the sweetest, quietest, most loving way. They are calling “chi-ca-go!” gently, back and forth. It is intimate and private. It touches me deeply. I can’t explain this, but somehow I know what they are saying, and as plain as day I hear them “don’t leave me” “I’m going now” “please stay” “I have to go” “I need you” “I’ll miss you”… They are saying goodbye to each other, and it is the saddest thing in the world. Gradually their calls slip into silence. I know that she’s gone, and my heart aches for the loss of life.

Six days later, I look outside the window, and see the male California Quail sitting where his mate was killed. I watch him out the window for a long time. He is perfectly still, his head held low. There are no other quails around. No other birds. Tufts of feathers from his mate are circled around him. He is sitting in the exact spot on the driveway where she is most present. I can’t explain this, but I know that he is grieving. It breaks my heart, but I also feel honoured to witness one bird’s connection to his mate, and to know that this is real. That birds remember. That birds have feelings. That birds know grief. That the truth is birds are not so different from ourselves.

Raven

The Dark and the Light held them.

The torch is but a distraction from being in the moment. It allows us to move into our heads, unable to see beyond the light in our eyes, causing us to stay in the tunnel that is the beam, this place of false security, which prevents us from venturing outside of the artificial light and into another world long forgotten.

The Dark and the Light command us to pay attention to our sense of place through our awareness of all things, from the rustle of the spider moving through the undergrowth to the blinking of an owl’s eye hidden in the foliage of the tree nearby. We need these things in order to help us understand our sense of community with Mother Earth.

"Do we need torches"? She asked one night as we were about to take the children up into the woods to build a fire under the cover of darkness. I answered "no, if we give them torches they will be off into the woods and we will have trouble keeping them together, the best way is to allow nature do the work for us, with their help".

So, off we set into the darkness, they followed each other in single file, some holding onto the person in front because they did not want to be separated from each other in the dark and in the woods. Once we reached the place we were going too, they set about building a fire in the darkness from the wood that had been collected earlier that day, there was about eight of them and the fire was built in no time. They had practised many times before in day light.

Out came the fire steel, it was struck several times, the char cloth caught the ember and held it ready to be transferred to the tinder bundle, blowing it into a reassuring flame it was transferred to the pile of wood that looked like a tepee, this was to be their fire. Up she roared, giant flames leaping two to three times the height of their heads, embers looking like firefly’s drifting off into the night air of the surrounding wood. Then out they came, the marshmallows, and as we sat warming them over the embers, the story telling began.

The fire had done its job; holding the children together while it listened to their tales and their laughter, keeping them safe and warm. Just as the darkness had done its job in keeping them together until they reach the safety of the camp fire.

Who needs torches when you have the Dark and the Light?

Golden Eagle or Whimbrel

Some years ago now I spent a week with my friend Jeremy Hasting who runs Islay Birding/Bushcraft on Islay. We lived in a cave along the coast were we shared story’s and experiences as well as exchanging ideas like Nature Awareness.

On the day of our return it soon became clear how relaxed we had become as a result of living out in the wilderness of Islay. We were birding on our return when I said to Jeremy I feel a Golden Eagle coming on and we both agreed that would round the week off very nicely. We were not disappointed a short while later we spotted a Golden Eagle.

Adopting the prone position we both spent some considerable time watching this magnificent bird when I heard what I first thought was a Curlew but turned out to be a Whimbrel. I decided to call out to it and almost immediately I got a response so I whistled to it again, once again it returned the call as it was moving from our front along to the right of our location.

Once more I called out with another whistled and sure enough the Whimbrel responded again this time I was aware that it had changed its course and was heading back towards us. The calling continued between the Whimbrel and myself and we could hear the Whimbrel getting closer the whole time my eyes were firmly fixed to my binoculars so as not to miss out on the rare opportunity of seeing a Golden Eagle.

As the Whimbrel got even closer I decided to look up from my binoculars just in time to see the Whimbrel gliding in just 3-4” directly over Jeremy’s head and then landing just out of arms reach from me. In all my years of bird watching never have I been so close to a Whimbrel as this, it was interesting that not even the bright coloured plastic bags that contained our sleeping bags even bothered it, it was clear to me that we were so relaxed and in a different state of being that the Whimbrel did not recognise us as humans.

I motioned to Jeremy to get the camera out to which he rightly replied this is not a camera moment. We spent some twenty minutes or more with the Whimbrel walking in and around us with just two brief moments were it very briefly alarmed and at one point lifted of the ground only to land again immediately, this I believe was because we had moved energetically from a heart space to a head space. Eventually we had to move on and I found it difficult to end such a truly magical moment.

Some months later I was running a course with Hannah from Natural Pathways during the introductions one of our clients said she had a question for me and I invited her to ask it. Her question to me was “Golden Eagle or Whimbrel” I immediately smiled a big smile and replied in a soft voice “without doubt Whimbrel”.

Since then this moment has become something that Jeremy and I pass between each other when we know someone is going to visit either one of us. Jeremy many thanks for being a part of that never to be reported once in Life time special moment.