THESE BIRDS ARE FOR
Crows travel in groups and cover an area five or six miles in
diameter. They tend to settle in some big tree in an area and post
sentries in inconspicuous places all around. This makes it almost
impossible to get close enough to shoot one. Any time two nice hunters
get within an impossible shooting distance one of the watchers begins
his kaw-kaw and the whole group vacates and heads toward the other side
of their domain. We didnít collect any bounty money.
We knew about sparrows, wrens, mocking birds, hawks, buzzards and
owls. The bird that really stood out above the rest was the scissortail.
These birds had long tails that were opened at times like a pair of
scissors. Little kids were often told that they might snip off their
noses! Because they were so belligerent it wasnít too hard to believe.
When a pair of scissortails took over an area for their nest and
hunting grounds they defended it angrily against any intruder. I have
seen them attack just about every type of bird including the vicious
hawks. They were quick to start irritating any animal that came near the
nest. In their attacks they were careful to keep enough distance between
them and their enemy to remain safe. They seemed to know where the blind
side of the invader was and they directed their attack there. Usually
animals would move on and get out of their way. Birds were inclined to
run instead of fight.
The same animosity was directed to nice boys like
and fluttering their wings. I donít remember actually getting pecked
but they convinced us that they would be willing to go that far. We
usually did what the other animals and birds did. We moved on.
We learned to tolerate the sassy birds and didnít waste too
much time worrying about them. They didnít bother us unless we
approached their territory. Our dogs didnít care for them and usually
ran away when the grouchy birds attacked. Cats were a little more
defensive and would jumps and slap at them for awhile. In the final
rounds the cats moved on and the birds left them alone.
Many years later part of my job was to monitor a tall tower and a
recording shack at its base. The tower held several weather recording
transmitters as well as radiation monitoring sensors. Cables from these
instruments were directed down the tower, into the shack and to a
teletype machine that recorded the reading day and night. I was expected
to keep the instruments working and keep rolls of paper on the machines
to record the vital information.
One of the hazards of this job was the appearance of a pair of
scissortails that claimed the area for their own and built a nest about
two-thirds of the way to the top of the fifty foot tower. When I had
trouble with the little windmill type transmitters that measured wind
speed they didnít want me climbing the ladder toward their nest. They
became very angry and darted angrily toward me flapping their wings. I
couldnít understand the harsh language they were using but Iím sure
it wasnít very nice. They actually raked the back of my neck with
their fluttering wings. I expected to lose an ear at any time.