Wake up – the birds have
Where would we be without nature's wake-up call of birds?
Thrushes seem to be the early risers although some times the
tui, along with the thrush, love to puff up their breast and render a striking
solo performance just before daybreak.
I would just soak up this time of the morning with a mug of
tea in hand as I made my way on foot to the morning milking. A friend told me
how years ago he was all set to take off for milking at 4am and, with no milk
for his coffee, tipped a liberal dash of Baileys Irish Cream into it and kept
his eyes on the sky as Halley's Comet was around, appearing at 4.10am.
He tripped on a rut in the track, slipped backwards and hit
his head. He saw stars all right, but not the one he was looking for. The dawn
chorus of birds had started by the time he had gathered himself up enough to
continue his journey.
Did you know that birds have a dialect as well as humans?
And some develop dialects according to their localities, particularly kokako,
tui and native robins. And, as they were the first inhabitants of this country,
we should do our utmost to protect them. Try telling that to the dairy
inspector years ago when he found a bird's nest in our roller door over by the
vat – “Major HAZARD,” he told me.
I laughingly called him a home-wrecker, then remembered how
we used to go birdnesting and blow the eggs and thread them on string.
The only bird I have never really liked was a parrot my
parents-in-law had housed in a huge portable cage under a shady tree. If it
rained, the parrot screeched “Charlie it's raining”, repeatedly until he was
moved inside.
This squeaking and squawking used to really annoy me, so I
sympathised with a friend whose parrot used to swear. After several warnings he
grabbed the parrot and threw it into the freezer.
The bird kicked and thrashed around, then all went silent.
After another few minutes of silence, the owner opened the freezer door and the
subdued parrot got out.
“I promise I won't swear again” said Polly. “By the way what
did the chicken in there do?”
I am so pleased we are managing to thin out the possums in
the bush on my runoff for, with the demise of these pests, comes back the
chorus of tui and pigeon and the trill of the bellbird.
I had three UK students on their overseas experience stay
with me for a few days and, over dinner, got to talking about reincarnation.
One guy said he wanted to come back as an eagle which prompted me to shout him
a ride in a local farmer’s microlight. Wow!! No bungy-jumping parasailing,
whitewater rafting equalled that flight – it was pure magic for him. The same
microlight was chased in the air by a magpie who was protecting her nest.
Now, the birds I admire most are the godwits. These migrant
birds fly 11,000km non-stop from Alaska – the longest uninterrupted migration
of any bird – to New Zealand every year in their thousands to nest only a few
kilometres away on the Ohiwa Spit, Whakatane, as well as Miranda on the Firth
of Thames. They have come from where there is no night and can feed on insects 24
hours a day. They stay for six to seven months, nesting and hatching chickens.
They arrive in October to return in April.
Outside the Maternity Annexe in Stratford, as a little girl,
I used to wonder at the long-legged plaster of Paris stork with celluloid doll
in a nappy. I was told God made the babies and the stork delivered them. Oh
yeah, so where the hell was that stork when I needed it 20 years later?
Oh well, life's full of surprises.
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