A magpie discovered the birdfeeder I put out for the finches and chickadees
in front of my house. Now, several times
each day, the magpie crashes my feeder.
It’s a one-bird party out there.
The magpie swoops down, grabs the edge of the feeder tray and flaps
furiously trying to remain in place in small space meant for small songbirds. Sometimes, the magpie ends up hanging upside-down
on the feeder. On occasion the bird lands
on the metal hook from which the feeder hangs and then slowly slides down the hook
to manage a kind of “drive-by” pecking at the seeds on the tray.
In all cases the feeder ends up swinging about wildly.
If any songbirds happen to be in the nearby trees, they hold back
and watch the magpie without challenge.
I would like to be angry about the magpie’s disruptive behavior,
but here is a bird that actually spends the entire year here in Montana. While all the pretty songbirds fly south for
winter, the magpies remain.
I make allowances for my fellow Montanans.
—Mitchell Hegman
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