Scolded By My New Mockingbird Overlord

The birds come, the birds go.

Some of them are seasonal-ish. Take the juncos. Back in the spring I noted that all of them seemed to have vanished, except for one. “Solo Junco.” Then they were back last fall, a dozen or more. Now they’re gone again – except for Solo Junco. I like to think he’s the smart one who’s figured out that there’s food here 24/7/365 and he doesn’t need to fly to some other continent to spend the summer.

There were bluebirds in the spring, more this year than last, until the neighbors’ trees got pruned within an inch of their lives. I was out in the front yard this evening, being scolded by my new mockingbird overlord, when I realized that I hadn’t seen a single bluebird in June or July after that tree trimming.

This evening while out in the back after dark, listening to the mockingbirds (again), I realized that I hadn’t heard the owls in at least two or three months. There are times when I’ll hear them three or four nights a week, at least a pair, sometimes more, hooting through the canyons. I hope they’re back sometime soon. I love listening to them. And occasionally seeing them.

It’s all cyclic, I guess, although I’m not doing a good job of tracking the data to record the cycles. I do remember in the spring, about the time that the juncos left, also noting that I was seeing relatively few mockingbirds. We often had dozens of them, especially noticable when there was an owl or a hawk around. They do tend to sound the alarm and make a racket. But I had only seen one or two in months.

About a month ago they came back in force, and again we have dozens in the neighborhood. One pair in particular seems to be hanging about our house, with the male being noticeably aggressive in the last few days. They might be building a nest in the rain gutters over the front door, or he might be getting worms and bugs out of the leaf debris in those gutters. Either way, when he gets interrupted by me going in or out of the front door, his displeasure is vocal and energetic.

This is what led me to today’s scolding. He was on the gutter’s edge right over my head, then flew down by the garage, then to the top of the garage where he could assert his dominance. Well, in theory. I wasn’t backing down, instead choosing to open a dialogue with proposals about how we could share the space like two reasonable critters.

I’m not sure that we made much progress. There are some translation and communication issues, to be sure. Perhaps I’ll see if he’s interested in taking food offerings of some sort.

If that gutter is being claimed by him, we’re going to need to figure out something in the next three and a half months. Christmas light season is right around the corner. Sort of. Given my recent encounters with gravity, climbing ladders to put up lights will be extra “special.” The last thing I’ll need is getting dive bombed by a pissed off mockingbird, treating me like he treats a hawk or owl.