My Bird Era

There are a lot of memes and jokes about how you start to like birds when you get old. I didn’t think it would happen to me, and yet, yesterday I found myself slowly creeping toward the bay window in my living room to get a closer look at a downy woodpecker in my tree without startling it.

I think every single friend I have has sent me this at some point. It makes me laugh so much every time!

When I was a teenager, and Scotty was on his mission, his mom would often take me on bird watching adventures. We went to the Great Salt Lake, the dump, Tracy Aviary, and various bird refuges. I don’t know why I went - I had no interest in birds, and honestly, I suffered. I must’ve been bored and lonely.

I never thought I’d give a hoot about birds (see what I did there?) but then in 2020, I ordered the bird-inspired board game Wingspan for myself for my birthday, and a pandemic hit and made life so slow and boring that birds suddenly became one of the most exciting parts of my existence. I downloaded the Wingsong app that lets you scan the cards from Wingspan and hear the bird calls. Then I downloaded Merlin Bird ID, which helps you identify birds by either sound or photo. I started going places to purposely look for birds - like the Great Salt Lake Shorelands and the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge. I even went to the dump and got an annual pass at Tracy Aviary.

We put birdhouses and bird feeders in our backyard. We ended up getting rid of the birdhouses, though, because we had a few batches of baby birds die in them, and we felt like murderers (and cleaning them out isn’t fun). So now we feed the birds, but we don’t provide them with lodging.

I’ve also become very set on taking photos of uncommon birds, as if I’m going to need to prove someday that I saw a grey heron by Target (true story). There’s a technique that anyone who takes photos of birds can relate to. You have to start taking pictures from way far back just in case the bird flies away. Then you sneak closer and take another photo… sneak closer and take another photo…sneak closer and take another photo… until the bird flies off. Which it will. Because birds do that sort of thing. 

Absolute truth.

So I unintentionally became a bit of a bird nerd. In fact, my friend Lynsie gave me a bird themed gift for my 40th birthday with a Bird Nerd shirt, a Nice Tits mug, and a bird sticker pack. 

But here’s the thing… sometimes I still hate birds.

Like in the summer when there are hundreds of them in our front tree every morning, and they chirp for two hours straight (4:00-6:00 am). 

SHUT UP, BIRDS!

And when magpies perch on our window frames and peck at the siding of our house.

And when geese leave their big, green, juicy turds all over the sidewalk and grass (sorry I got so graphic there).

And when robins dart at my head and ruffle my hair because they laid eggs in my yard, and I have the audacity to go outside and try and water my garden. 

And I really don’t like grackles. Them and their weird, beady eyes, and their parking lot lifestyles, and their annoying screeches. 

Ugh. Birds. The relationship is complicated. 

One thing I have to say about birds, though, is that love them or hate them, I really stink at identifying them. Thank heavens for the aforementioned Merlin Bird ID app because without it, I’d just call everything a penguin, much to my mother-in-law’s dismay.

The app is probably what has made bird watching the most exciting. It’s really fun to walk through a park or other bird-y area and scan for bird songs to see what’s around. A few years ago at Young Women camp I got out of bed really early and was tiptoeing around camp between everyone’s tents like a creeper holding my phone out as it scanned for birds. To anyone who doesn’t know what I’m doing when I’m scanning for birds (which is mostly everyone) I probably look like a total weirdo.

So even though there are some things about birds that still annoy me, I’ve mostly crossed over to Bird Enjoyment. I guess you could say I’m in my Bird Era.