Maggie's Farm

Cool bird. I have not seen hawks in our neighborhood, but we have had several owls in recent years. I think barn owls. We do not have a birdfeeder because there are too many raccoons in our neighborhood, frequently rabid. After several trips by animal control to shoot sick raccoons, we try to avoid anything like squirrel...er....bird feeders that might attract them.

We have glorious herons and egrets on a tidal pond we enjoy watching from our deck. I love the contrast between their exquisite lines and their ugly screeches and their mundane digging in the mud for snails, etc. Beauty and the muck. I suppose we are all a bit like that: in flight, from some angles, breathtaking, but taking sustenance and generally solidly mired in the mundane.


But my wicked hunting cat would get any birds that got too close. We have trained her not to go after them when we are around (a water spritzer is good aversive conditioning), but we couldn't guard a feeder all day.


I know you hate cats, BD, but ours caught three mice in the house this weekend alone (careless teenagers leave back door open and the cold drives the mice in) and earns her keep with the rodents that she dispatches. She is a truly elegant predator. I know, I know, you will say that she is not native....I am trying to get her to hunt squirrels, without any luck. The dog is too old and slow now.