saving the world, one baby birdie at a time

Today I gave Mother Nature a little hand.

As it is late Spring here in the Northern Hemisphere, there are many baby birds hatching from their nests in the various trees, filling the air with the joyful and sometimes frantic chirping of newly hatched chicks and first-time parents. New birds are learning to spread their wings and fly from their comfortable nests. However, this first flight can actually end up being much more of a stumble into a situation out of which Baby Birdie cannot quite find a way!

I heard a very insistent chirping coming from the garage early this afternoon, so I sent the little monkeys to investigate. The chirping ceased and no bird flew out of the garage, so I decided to take a look around. I could see nothing and, as there was no more chirping had no sound assistance to go on. Coming out of the garage, I noticed gray fuzz in my big rosemary bush, behind my lavender and oregano in my herb garden. It was a baby mockingbird! Still with some newborn down on its head and little feet that are way too big for its body, but just looking at me and staying calm in the rosemary. I called the children over and we all quietly admired this being that had no choice but to be our captive entertainment.

I thought that I was perhaps mistaken, that Rosemary Birdie was the one that I had heard and that it had gotten lost from its Mama Birdie. But then the panicked chirping ensued. We returned to the garage but found nothing. La Princesita's ride then arrived to wisk her off to play for the afternoon, so the Young Prince and Mama Llama were left alone to solve this mystery.

The chirping began again. Silently I entered the garage, deducing from the sound that it was on the right-hand side. Following the chirps, I found Baby Birdie #2 on top of one of the front wheels of the lawn mower! Remembering that baby bunnies, if carrying the scent of humans on their fur when newborn are eaten by their families, I quickly found a sweatshirt and inserted my arms and hands into the arms of the pullover so that I could catch the bird without tarnishing it in any way with my scent. I had to "calmly chase" the creature around a bit but, after a bit of coaxing was able to gently grab Baby Birdie #2 and ever so lightly carry it out to be with its sibling out on the rosemary.

There they sat for a good while, siblings, the one from the garage squawking quite a bit in protest of their mother having pushed them out the nest. "How dare you! You see what happened? We weren't ready and had to deal with those HUMANS you warned us about! And you pushed us into their world!" The eternal child-to-parent guilt trip--I could hear it in the chirp.

Later this afternoon, upon The Young Prince and my return, we noticed that one of the babies was gone. Still remaining was the vociferous one, but even it had gone from the rosemary to the stones just below the lavender. I mentioned to my son that it might be a good idea to watch from the large window overlooking our driveway and see what happens.

Sure enough, in flies Mama (or Papa, who knows) Birdie and gives Baby Birdie something to eat. Then Mama flies to the fence, looking back as if trying to coax Baby to follow. Baby stands its ground.

Later, I see Mama making another approach, hopping over the driveway and back to the fence. I never did see Baby Birdie follow as I was also sauteeing my first garden squash of the season, but when I went out to check on Baby's progress, I was surprised to see that Baby Birdie was gone!

I doubt Baby Birdie would have found its way out of the garage, or if Mama Birdie would have gone in after it to coax it out of hiding. So I feel that my intervention was warranted and gave Mother Nature a bit of a helping hand this afternoon.

After all--we are all in this together, are we not?