Re: Great Tailed Grackles, Mourning Doves, and Me

"Reunite Gondwanaland (Mary Shafer)" wrote:
> 
> 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, ****ny 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. 


They'll drink as soon as they're done with the bread.




> 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 re****ts about it.
> reunite.gondwana@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 or miliff@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Visit my blog at http://thedigitalknitter.blogspot.com/