Tag: animals

“hey. hey. hey where’d you go”
life

“hey. hey. hey where’d you go”

J.3 Comments

So, my spouse and I went to an out-of-town family shindig the weekend before July 4th. It was a lot of fun — there was a ton of food, live music, and a huge crowd of interesting people to talk to (many of whom are also Garden People like me).

When I came back, the yard was silent. My heart dropped into my stomach.

Was it because I wasn’t there to keep the food and water replenished? Was it the fireworks? Had someone gotten injured or killed, scaring the whole murder away?
Did something happen to Boink?

I put fresh water and the usual mix of food (peanut butter cereal, cat kibble, dried bugs, and berries) out, but all I got was a clamorous mob of starlings.

(Apparently a group of starlings can be called an “affliction,” which sounds about right. I love all of the birds that come to my home, but most of these are, to put it bluntly, invasive shrieking dickheads who throw things.)

A day went by, then another. I lost sleep and felt my urge to write or paint completely sapped. So much of my art is inspired by these magnificent little weirdos, I hated the idea of working on a painted bird when the real ones had disappeared.

Then this happened.

A crow, head cocked, peers through a bathroom window.
“hey, you there? you guys back n- oh, you poopin?”

The crows returned by having this guy rock up to the bathroom window (please ignore the spots on the glass — the rain and pollen have fingerpainted everything) and stare inside. They twisted their head from one side to the other, very deliberately peering in. If they had hands, they probably would’ve cupped them around their eyes to see better.

It was funny, but, in retrospect, also somewhat concerning. Did they watch us leave? Did they send someone to stare into our house every day to see if we were back yet? There are so many windows, you guys, why did they pick the bathroom?!

Anyhow, the big maple tree is once again filled with raucous caws and shiny black birds. I’ve seen Magni and Muse, and even Boink has once again taken up his position on top of the shed. (I have no idea where — or how, for that matter — he went for several days at a time. I’m just glad he’s back.)

It does my heart good to see them. I just kind of wish they’d maybe peeked in the kitchen instead.

This is Boink.
life

This is Boink.

J.Leave a comment

Crows are sleek, beautiful, intelligent creatures.

And then there’s Boink.

Boink looks like he was made by Jim Henson with spare parts and a strict time limit. He looks like what birds would look like in the Fraggle universe.

Boink is not injured, but has somehow managed to damage all of the flight feathers on one wing and half of his tail. He can fly, but it’s the flight a bird whose wings have been clipped — just enough to keep from falling, until his flight feathers grow back in. His main means of locomotion is to hop and scramble in a way that even the best foley artist would have difficult putting a sound to.

A small, scruffy crow gazes pensively through slats in a deck railing.
Boink having a small philosophical moment.

He spends most of the day hanging out on the railing by my back door. When I open it, he jumps up and… well, boinks his way across the deck to the shed. He hops on the roof, bops his way to the other side, and ducks down with his little head sticking up like a periscope.

If I look at him, he ducks.

If I pretend to close the door, he pokes his head up again.

If I go back inside, he moves back to the railing to sit.

Boink is the scruffiest wild animal that I’ve ever seen. He is the prime specimen of scrunginess. An absolute scrunglemuppet. He is Mother Nature’s silliest fool and I love him very much.

He doesn’t seem to have trouble avoiding predators, somehow — when he needs to hide, he hides behind the other shed, or climbs up the big apple tree. It makes me grateful that I didn’t prune it as much as I should have, because the lowermost branches give Boink something to hop onto and make his way up.

(I don’t even really know if he’s a he. In my defense, I don’t think Boink does either.)

I think that Boink may have a criminal record. He doesn’t seem to have a mate to help take care of him, and the other crows push him away from the feeders. I sneak extra portions of food into places I know he can reach easily and put extra fruit and dried bugs to make up for the things he may not be able to forage for himself.

A small, scruffy crow sitting on a deck railing in the rain.
“Hoh. Kibble for Boink? No! Cereals for Boink? No! Every time, they bully Boink.”

The other crows also don’t seem to have a problem with leaving Boink behind, too. Is he Outlaw Boink? Has he been ostracized for crimes, or do they just leave him because they know he’s safe, with his water dish and his food stashes and his shed roof?

I don’t know what Boink did, or what happened to him. He sits on my deck like a tiny, questionably useful gargoyle. He is my very special boy and his presence is delightful.

I can only assume that they’re developing agriculture.
life

I can only assume that they’re developing agriculture.

J.Leave a comment

Not long ago, I mentioned that the crows in the yard bartered me for a small rock painted to look like a strawberry. Now, the whole reason I had a rock painted to look like a strawberry was to keep birds from eating my actual strawberries. The idea behind it is that you put out strawberry decoys before the plants set fruit, and the birds will investigate them, decide they’re inedible, and assume that the rest of your strawberries are similar levels of bullshit. Seems legit, right?

A strawberry plant with a few ripening strawberries.

These rocks aren’t the only things the crows have been interested in. When my spouse’s mom came for a visit, she remarked that she’d seen the crows playing with some of those little black plastic pots you get from plant nurseries. (I have a few on a shelf on my deck. They’re useful for starting plants, and I’d rather re-use them as much as possible and keep them out of the landfill.) I thought this was funny, but didn’t really put much more thought into it. I had a thing, the crows thought this thing was amusing and interesting, and that was that.

Then I noticed that I had lost all of the strawberry rocks in the back yard and one of the raised beds in the front. Just up and vanished.

Then my spouse mentioned seeing a crow flying away with an empty plant pot in its beak. He’d tried to snap a picture, but only managed to get a blur of tail feathers as the thief absconded.

Putting two and two together, I can only assume one thing: They’re developing agriculture.

Maybe it isn’t aliens or artificial intelligence that we need to worry about. Maybe humanity’ll be overthrown by a race of swiftly advancing, hyperintelligent birds. People remark on the intelligence of corvids, and they’re correct. Crows, ravens, and their kin are very smart. They’re also coming for your horticultural supplies.

If you’re reading this at some point in the future, when the human race is relegated to the annals of bird history as some kind of combination of amusing pets and manual labor force, and our bird overlords have ushered in a new era of art nouveau solarpunk luxury forest communism, I apologize for not being at all sorry because that actually sounds awesome.

Like a tiny Mafia I never needed, wanted, or asked for.
life

Like a tiny Mafia I never needed, wanted, or asked for.

J.Leave a comment

So the local murder has been particularly active lately. The backyard is a playpen for their babies, the roof of the old shed and the big red maple are their vantage points, and it does my heart good to hear their excited clamoring when they see me step outside to leave them crow salad. Though I know almost nobody is as excited about these developments as I am, I still talk about them way too much.

Anyway, I’m also pretty sure they straight-up performed an execution in my front yard.

(If you’re sensitive about the deaths of animals, maybe skip this post and come back tomorrow. There’s a fun bit about bee balm that I think you might like.)

A crow silhouetted against a moon.

Where there are crows, there are almost always squirrels. This is unfortunate, because the two aren’t friends. Squirrels compete for resources and eat crow eggs. Crows eat baby squirrels. It’s a whole Thing.

The ones here have managed to coexist to the point where they seem to take turns raiding the feeders, and the crows have felt secure enough to tend to their families in the back yard despite the presence of a squirrel or two.

Unfortunately, some furry interloper has been wreaking havoc lately. They dug up my comfrey starts, tore up my baby watermelons, and threw the pink dahlia onto the concrete. The latest round of destruction, apparently, was enough for the crows to decide to send a message — in the form of a furry corpse, completely unmarked save for strategically placed, beak-sized puncture wounds. The injuries tell of a crow’s nature, since it looks like something landed on the squirrel and proceeded to do the dark deed. What’s very odd, though, is that the squirrel was otherwise untouched. Crows are nothing if not opportunistic, and they’re scavengers. Even if this squirrel was killed by a stray cat or ill-timed BB, they probably would’ve eaten it some of it.

This raises one question: Why merk a squirrel and then leave it right in my path, untouched?

Do they consider the front yard their territory enough to be invested in the landscaping? Did they think this was a favor? All, “Hey, we took care of that guy. You’re welcome.”

I’ve gotten gifts from them before. Was this a present?

“Thanks for all of the meals! Here is a meal for you, on us.
It is: One dead squirrel. Bon appétit!”

My spouse remarked that he’d never seen this much action in the suburban area around the house he grew up in. I reminded him that we were actively trying to cultivate more biodiversity and a closer existence with nature. The thing is, when you try to see more nature, it’s only too happy to show you all of it. Even the red and toothy parts.

We buried the squirrel in the back yard, in the shade of the big red maple tree. I feel bad for the little guy, but at least it seems his death was swift.

I do feel like an extremely goth Snow White, though.

I need to wield this power responsibly.

I mean, it’s pretty much an avian daycare at this point.
Environment · life

I mean, it’s pretty much an avian daycare at this point.

J.Leave a comment

I don’t know why this surprises me. I knew — or at the very least hoped — that developing a relationship with the birds here would mean lots of baby birds.

I just didn’t really count on their parents dropping them off on my doorstep.

This is not code language. After dealing with deadbeat cabbage butterflies last year, I thought my need to concern myself with the reproduction of the local wildlife had more or less come to an end. However, I was incorrect. Like, really incorrect.

The crows (there are seven or eight of them now) dropped off a fledgling in the back yard. He hops and makes a few bold (if futile) attempts at flying, then ends up hiding behind my shed most of the time. Magni and the others post up on the roof of the shed most of the day, and I’ve seen Magni carrying peanut butter puffs to the baby, so at least the little one’s parents are aware of what their kid is doing.

The house sparrows dropped one of their kids off on my porch. It came up and kind of scratched at the door, much to the confusion of myself and the cats.

A view of a sparrow fledgling on a doormat, seen through a glass storm door.
Kid, where are your parents?!

All of this means that I spend a not-insignificant portion of the day treating the yard like some kind of avian daycare center. I keep the bowls topped up with fresh, cool water, leave fruit and dried bugs where they can forage without going into the road or where neighborhood cats can get them, make sure there aren’t any confrontations, and make sure there are shady spots for them to hide out during the sunniest part of the day. It’s been kind of hot, and the wildfire smoke hasn’t done anyone any favors, so I’ve tried to make things easy on everybody involved. I don’t want the babies to become too used to just scooping up snacks from the bird feeders, though, so I toss them berries and bugs on the grass.

A handsome crow stands on a deck railing, looking up toward the camera.

We have a pair of cardinals here, too, but I don’t know what they’re up to just yet. There’s still the side yard and the driveway, so who knows where they’ll unload their brood.

I have to admit, as much as I worry about the babies (are they learning to find food well? Are they staying hydrated? Are they away from cats and snakes?), it’s kind of nice knowing that their parents seem to consider this a safe spot. They’ve even stopped flying far when I go out to refill the feeders and water dishes — the sparrows stay in the apple trees, and the crows hop to the fence and roof until I’m finished. Sometimes, when I sit out there to meditate and get some sunlight, they’ll land on the deck and go about their business anyhow.
It’s nice. Being ignored never felt so good.

A curious crow peers down from the edge of a roof.
Pardon the blurriness. I looked up and spied this one watching me and had a fraction of a second to snap a pic before they hopped down to the water dish.
Crow commerce. Crowmmerce.
life

Crow commerce. Crowmmerce.

J.Leave a comment

Birds like fruit. Some fruits, like prickly pears, actually evolved to benefit from the acidic environment of an animal’s digestive tract. The exposure to acid helps make it easier for the seeds to germinate. The fruits are delicious to incentivize animals to eat them and scatter the seeds around. Neat, huh?

This means that, if you are both planning to grow fruits for your own consumption and also exist in a place with birds, you need a plan. A big part of my plan involved just planting an absolute buttload of strawberry plants. Some will be eaten, sure, but that’s a sacrifice that I’m happy to make.

The other part of my plan involved special rocks.

The idea is that, if you’re concerned about birds getting into your fruit, you place inedible, non-toxic decoys around. Decorate the areas immediately around your strawberry plants with mediumish-sized rocks painted to look like strawberries, for example, and birds will leave your actual strawberries alone.

You have to do this before the plants actually set fruit, though. This is so birds have a chance to peck at the fake ones, be disappointed, and complain about your crappy, hard, imposter strawberries to all of the other birds before the real strawberries show up.

So far, it seems to be working! My strawberries haven’t produced a whole lot yet (mostly because the majority of them were just twiggy little starts a few weeks ago), but the few I’ve gotten have been untouched.

The crows, however, appear to be fascinated by my various gardening objects.

The younger ones like to play with the small black plant pots from the nursery. If a new thing shows up, they bop around to thoroughly investigate its amusement potential.

My strawberry rocks appear to be a huge hit. The crows are even trying to buy them off of me.

For serious. The strawberry decoy rock in my terracotta pot vanished, and, in its place, I received one (1) thoroughly pecked blue foam ball. It’s a very pretty shade of blue, and I appreciate it, but I’m also extremely curious about the corvid thought process that goes, “Yes. One red rock = one blue ball. Pleasure to do a business, okay.”

A hand holds a round blue ball made of some kind of stiff foam material. The ball is covered in tiny peck/chew marks.

The thing is, I put all kinds of tasty stuff in their platform feeder as it is. Grapes. Blueberries. Bits of strawberries. And, like I said, the whole, growing strawberries have gone untouched by beak or claw. They seriously only wanted that one, particular decoy strawberry, and apparently valued it highly enough to barter for it.

I’m honestly kind of tempted to go rockhounding and see if I can pick up some nice, sparkly rocks to put by the platform feeders. We have a ton of mica around here, so I’m pretty confident that I could find something suitably eye-catching for them.

I mean, I know they’re no strawberry rocks, but maybe the crows’ll like them anyway.

Crow Salad
Environment · life

Crow Salad

J.Leave a comment

“Man, that salad outside looks good. I’m almost jealous.”

It’s not really a salad, though. It’s sunflower seeds. Cracked corn. Peanuts. A handful of blueberries and strawberry tops, garnished with an equal handful of cat kibble.

On of the things I love about where I live is that it’s the territory of a family of crows. I don’t know them very well yet, but there are two who stand out: one I call Magni, because he’s the largest, most intimidating, and usually spends his time acting as a sentry for the others. Another, I call Muse. This one’s smaller and doesn’t fly far when I go out to fill the bird feeders — only to the other edge of the deck, where they sit and wait for me to finish. (I call them “Muse” because this behavior means that they’re the easiest member of the family to snap pictures of, so I have tons that I can use for painting references.)

I’ve planted plenty of things that crows like, though that’s mostly just different kinds of berries for now: three elderberries by the big maple tree, dozens of strawberries, four blueberry bushes. The little mock strawberries, embedded in the grass and clover like jewels, I leave alone. They’re not strictly desired, but their bright red berries are still edible and sought after by birds.

As the weather warms up, I see more and more small friends coming to share crow salad. There’re the ubiquitous house sparrows, song sparrows, cardinals, starlings, juncos, and one cocky blue jay. I sit in my kitchen, peering over the edge of the windowsill, to see where they go once they’ve eaten their fill. Kiko and JJ sit on the mat, chattering in their strange little cat language to birds that will never reply.

I’d like to befriend the crows that visit here, but the advice I’ve seen hasn’t been much help. I’ve tried crow calls, but they respond better to my ridiculous sing-song, “Hello, babies!” People say to give them peanuts, but these guys are more excited for cat kibble and odds and ends of fruit. Sometimes, though not often, they’ll sneak an orange tomato from my bush and fly off with it like raven stealing the sun.

This summer, there might be wild pigeon grapes too. Next, there’ll be beautyberry. Hopefully they like those.

Good News Round Up: 6.17.2022
Link round up

Good News Round Up: 6.17.2022

J.Leave a comment

Hello! Have you ever wondered what your dog’s thinking? As it turns out, scientists might have an answer for you — sort of. This is a collection of posts and articles that I thought were interesting, funny, or just made me feel a little better about the state of things. I hope they can do the same for you.

A Glimpse Into the Dog’s Mind: A New Study Reveals How Dogs Think of Their Toys. Apparently, dogs have a “multi-modal mental image” when it comes to their favorite playthings. That means that they most likely focus on what is, to them, an object’s most significant sensory features — like its smell. Scientists discovered this by having dogs search for their toys under varying conditions, and observing which senses they seemed to rely on the most for specific objects.

Plants Appear to Be Breaking Biochemistry Rules by Making ‘Secret Decisions.’ As it turns out, plants make decisions about their respiration in ways that we didn’t anticipate. They can actually choose how much carbon they release, by deciding how much they retain for building more biomass. This all happens via a molecule called pyruvate. Most interestingly, plants can actually track what sources their pyruvate comes from, and factor that into their decision making process.

This DIYer Made the Coolest Boho Bookends for Only $1.75 , and They Look Straight Out of a CB2 Catalog. Are you into biophilic design? This is a design philosophy that uses natural materials, like wood and stone, which have beneficial impacts on our mental well-being. This super cheap, easy DIY uses a scrap of travertine limestone, and there’s no perfectionism allowed — the perfectly imperfect, organic shape of the material is part of the appeal.

Binding and Burying the Forces of Evil: The Defensive Use of “Voodoo Dolls” in Ancient Greece. The popular image of the “Voodoo doll” has little to do with the practice of Voodoo. The classic image of a human-shaped object that you stick pins in to cause harm is much closer to the concept of the poppet, a vehicle for sympathetic magic. This paper discusses the use of effigies as a means of binding and suppressing evil in ancient Greece, as well as similar binding rituals in Egypt and Assyria. It’s a long read, but an interesting one.

Researchers identify the origins of the Black Death. We all know that the bubonic plague came from fleas that carried Yersinia pestis, but how did the fleas get it to begin with? One popular theory held that it came from wild rodents in East Asia, but archaeological evidence and ancient plague genomes tell a different story.

Project: SigilPen. I often have to explain that Neodruidry is my religion, but witchcraft is a method. I use modern Druid magic, and I use witchcraft, though the two are very different. Either way, I love magical alphabets, sigils, and the concept of language and symbols as a form of magic on their own. SigilPen is a way of creating neat, accurate sigils using a magic square (kamea).

A lot of online sources for sigil magic fall into the trap of using a single magical square — usually the Square of Saturn — rather than choosing the kamea that’s aligned with what you’re actually trying to do. SigilPen allows you to choose whatever square you want to work with, and helps you translate your word, phrase, or name into a sigil. The site has several other very interesting tools for modern magic, aside from the SigilPen.

Pretend I folded this up and passed it to you under a desk.
– j.

A cat snuggled up in a hotel bed. I’ve been translating my cat.
life

I’ve been translating my cat.

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I mean, that’s not what’s kept me busy for the past twenty or so days, but it’s a small project I’ve embarked on.

(What did keep me away was an absolute ton of paid writing. It’s hard to write all day and then still feel like I want anything to do with words by the time I’m done. This is especially true when that writing involves hours of researching things like metallurgy and UV-C lighting. By the end of it, my brain is tired and feels like the tail end of a discarded boba tea.)

About a week ago, my S.O. and I found the app Meow Talk. It claimed to be able to record cat noises and translate them into something understandable to humans. I consider myself pretty perceptive when it comes to figuring out what these nerds are trying to say to me, but, admittedly, I was curious. How accurate could a cat recording app really be?

A fangy-toothed cat sleeping upside down.

As it turns out, eerily so. It correctly interpreted all his weird little greeting chirps as “Hello.” He also tells the fridge “I love you,” and responds to my attempts to smooch him with “I AM IN PAIN.” Like I said, accurate. Meow Talk isn’t even paying me for this endorsement. I’m just genuinely surprised and tickled that someone was able to interpret my cats weird little trills and yowls. I haven’t yet managed to capture one of his weird 3 AM TED Talks to no one, or the paid mourner-style wailing he does every time we move a piece of furniture, but I’m working on it.

It doesn’t really work on Kiko, but she primarily communicates through touch. If someone makes an app that can turn little paw-taps into human speech, I’d be all over it. So far, I’ve managed to figure out her “please sit by my bowl and watch me eat,” “smooch my head,” and “roll over, I need to nap on your stomach. It’s an emergency” bops, but she’s developed a very robust punching-based language that defies interpretation a majority of the time.

If you have a cat, especially a vocal one, I recommend messing around with the Meow Talk app. It’s fun, if nothing else, and could be informative. Especially if your cat has a weird attachment to appliances.

A Bicycle Built for Who
life

A Bicycle Built for Who

J.Leave a comment

Some people don’t like the idea of adopting rescue animals, especially adult ones. They worry that they won’t be as trainable as a puppy or kitten — they might have all kinds of behavioral issues and odd quirks from their past home(s).

To be perfectly honest, I’m pretty sure Kiko and Pye were normal before we got them. (At least, I’m reasonably certain that Pye didn’t throw noisy tantrums if you neglected to sit next to him and eat cereal in the morning.)

I don’t know how Kiko could’ve survived otherwise. Her history indicates she was an outdoor cat — undersized, post-partum, a hair’s breadth from losing a leg to gangrene. Now, she taps my forehead to wake me up to watch her eat, will only drink out of a special pink teacup, requires smooches on the head at exactly 11:30 AM, and knows that the sound of me brushing my teeth means it will shortly be Cuddle Time. She won’t eat cat treats — her preferred snacks are strawberry yogurt and butter lettuce. She doesn’t like to walk through the apartment, either — she’ll launch herself face-first at my ankles, cry and hold up a paw as if she’s injured, and make big, sad eyes at me until I pick her up.

Her favorite thing, though, is the exercise bike.

I have a bog-standard stationary bike ever since my cardiologist recommended that I start taking short, easy rides to rebuild my endurance. I don’t know how, and I don’t know when, but Kiko made up her macadamia-sized mind that This Was an Activity of Buddies.

And so, she chubbles.

She sits at the edge of the bed, gazing up at me with her cartoonishly large, round eyes. She knows she has me wrapped around her little white paws, and all she has to do is wait patiently. If I fail to respond, she daintily taps at my knee.

Eventually, I will have to pick her up.

I always do.

I have no idea what she gets out of this. It’s a stationary bike. We don’t go anywhere. There is nothing to see but the bedroom door. She nestles herself into my elbow, flops her head back to mush her face on mine and give me her little :3 smile, and purrs. And she’ll stay like that until I’m done pedaling.

There’s no reason for it. She could be ignoring me, happily cuddling with my partner. The second she hears the telltale boop of my exercise tracker app, she pries herself away to chubble at me. She could be asleep, she’ll wake up. She could be in a different room, I’ll hear the strawberry bell on her collar jingling as she hurries from wherever she’s been hiding. She cannot get enough of turning me into some kind of incredibly inefficient one-person palanquin.

So, yes. Sometimes, when you adopt an older animal, they can be a little weird. Most of the time, it’s in the best way.