Great Tailed Grackles, Mourning Doves, and Me

The developed areas of the Coachella Valley are home to a surprising
variety of birds.  We regularly see ravens, hummingbirds, roadrunners,
California quail, great tailed grackles, mourning doves, rock doves,
tanagers, and orioles in our yard.  I hadn't been paying much
attention to them, except to notice that we have mourning doves
nesting in our lemon tree.

That all changed about a week or so back.  I had managed to let half a
loaf of sourdough bread get stale, so I thought that, rather than
throw it away, I'd tear it into small pieces and put it out in the
courtyard for the birds.  I'd never really had much of a problem with
stale bread before because all of my dogs have loved it and gladly
helped use it up before it staled, but that was how my mom got rid of
stale bread, so that's what I did.

It took a little while for the birds to discover the bread, but now my
courtyard is a regular stop for the great tailed grackles and the
mourning doves.  I added some wheat berries to the offerings, on the
theory that whole grain is healthier for birds than bread.  The birds,
particularly the grackles, vastly prefer the bread to the wheat,
though.

Of course, the bread dries out quite quickly, so the grackles have
taken to grabbing a cube of bread and flying over to the top of the
waterfall.  There they dip the bread into the water to soften it and
then eat it.  They also routinely drink from it, too.

It has been just wonderful, watching the birds.  The grackles include
full-grown males (big, shiny black, long-tailed birds) and females
(smaller and browner), as well as younger birds, probably this year's
crop (smallest, short-tailed, brown).  Just in the ten days or so that
I've been watching them the younger birds have grown.  Their tails are
getting longer, too.

The behavior of the birds is fascinating.  There's a very definite
pecking order and we occasionally see some dominance games.  The big
male grackles honk (there's no other word for it) to settle things.
The doves get into little squabbles, too, and don't hang around when
the grackles show up.  A roadrunner dropped by to see what was
happening, but left and hasn't returned.  The guides say they'll eat
strips of raw meat; they sure don't eat bread.

As I write this there are four grackles picking up bread and a fifth
sitting on the edge of the waterfall.  There are a couple on the roof,
too.  Dinnertime, I guess.

I've ordered tray feeders and bird feed that all the birds we have
(except the roadrunner) are said to like.  These should show up on
Monday.  I'm very interested in seeing how the birds transition from
bread cubes scattered on the concrete to seeds and nuts in a tray
feeder.

Mary "It's for the birds.  Really."
-- 
Mary Shafer   Retired aerospace research engineer
We didn't just do weird stuff at Dryden, we wrote reports about it.
reunite.gondwana@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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 my blog at http://thedigitalknitter.blogspot.com/