Birds of a Feather

…flock together. And we have a variety in our backyard. Morning and evening, a wedge of geese flies over. A charm of finches flutter around our feeders. A posse of turkeys parade across the green space, some brave enough to jump the fence. They are welcome to gobble grapes, now that the harvest is safely being processed. We left enough for the birds to enjoy.
A murder of crows showed up last week, dozens cawing from the tops of the redwood trees. Crows are intelligent. They are shrewd. They can problem-solve and make tools, like bending a hook on the end of a stick to dig insects from a log or dropping bait to catch a small fish. They are also “monogamish”, sticking with one mate, though males are known to carry on with other females and build several families within the roost. They are also raucous. They gossip and hold grudges, and delight in murder. They are bullies that hang out together in a gang, eager to kill the young of songbirds, cawing loudly as they group together and chase prey, even dive-bombing humans mowing a lawn or walking to the mailbox.

“Choose your friends wisely,” my mother said when I was a child. Listen. Watch. See what kind of character a person has before you enter a relationship. And the same caution applied to small groups and communities. How are members “like minded”?

I see a murder of crows growing, ever eager to kill off the flush of quail, the charm of finches, the flight of swallows. Perhaps they will begin to act like a squabble of seagulls, fighting one another for whatever “profits” they can steal.

I avoid crows. I would rather fly in a wedge of geese that honk encouragement to one another as they face headwinds, be a member of a flush of quail where the father watches over mom and their babies or join a squadron of pelicans drifting serenely over the waves.

Birds of a feather flock together. Be careful which flock you join.