My Saturday morning began quite uneventfully. I took my coffee and my bible and devotion books to the shaded corner of my deck. The only reason it is shaded early in the morning is because the neighbor has let a black walnut tree (some crazy squirrel buried a walnut and obviously couldn't remember where he put it) grow amok in the corner of his yard. The tree isn't too old but the huge limbs are hanging over the corner of my deck.
It really has not been a problem. A pair of robins even built a nest in the fork of one of the branches. So far, so good. Peaceful...the neighbor's (do you see a pattern here?) big yellow cat is wandering around, Iggy, my dog, is sleeping under my chair. He and the cat have become friends over the springtime.
In a nano-second, the cat leaped from my deck railing to the branches of the tree, knocking the robin's nest down onto the deck. The 3 half-grown robins are flapping around, the cat wanting to eat them, the dog, now, wanting to get in on the action. He can't decide if he should also eat the birds, chase the cat or hide from the woman who a minute ago was setting in the deck chair and now is screaming unintelligable language at the birds, and the cat and him.
I felt like the nursery rhyme: the cat chased the birds, (not the rat, or I would have let her have it) the dog chased the cat and the old lady swallowed a fly..I don't know why, she swallowed a fly; perhaps she'll die. I forgot to add, the 2 adult robins are dive-bombing the cat and dog and me, while I tell them, "I'm trying to save your kids, you stupid birds." (A scene from The Birds could be inserted here.)
I finally put all 3 birds back in the nest and tried putting the nest back in the tree. I whacked the cat with my fireplace poker and put the dog in the house. Needless to say, the nest was a little worse for wear, since falling 6 feet onto a wooden deck tends to crack the mud on the bottom. I put it back where it was. It stayed but precariously. I decided I couldn't stay there for the next 2 weeks and keep the cat away, so.. armed with my trusty eagle beak clippers, I cut every branch I could reach off that tree. This neighbor only mows his grass once a month, so I'm pretty certain he won't notice. Now the cat can't get to them. Okay. Work done, right? Au contraire.
In 5 minutes, Mom Robin perched on the side of the nest and it fell out again. By now I'm not sure if the babies are alive or dead, but I decided to move the nest to a bigger tree where it would be safer. I placed it in the crotch of 2 branches and thought it was pretty safe. Not so.
The parents must have called the extended family, because now I have 8 robins swooping over my head and not one of them can figure out the new location of the nest. By the way, I just read an article about the fact that you shouldn't touch a baby bird because the parents will smell human, etc. It said that was an old wives' tale and not true. Good thing.
The bottom of that nest was almost non-existent by now, so my next solution was to put it in a plastic easter bucket and hang it in the tree.
It really has not been a problem. A pair of robins even built a nest in the fork of one of the branches. So far, so good. Peaceful...the neighbor's (do you see a pattern here?) big yellow cat is wandering around, Iggy, my dog, is sleeping under my chair. He and the cat have become friends over the springtime.
In a nano-second, the cat leaped from my deck railing to the branches of the tree, knocking the robin's nest down onto the deck. The 3 half-grown robins are flapping around, the cat wanting to eat them, the dog, now, wanting to get in on the action. He can't decide if he should also eat the birds, chase the cat or hide from the woman who a minute ago was setting in the deck chair and now is screaming unintelligable language at the birds, and the cat and him.
I felt like the nursery rhyme: the cat chased the birds, (not the rat, or I would have let her have it) the dog chased the cat and the old lady swallowed a fly..I don't know why, she swallowed a fly; perhaps she'll die. I forgot to add, the 2 adult robins are dive-bombing the cat and dog and me, while I tell them, "I'm trying to save your kids, you stupid birds." (A scene from The Birds could be inserted here.)
I finally put all 3 birds back in the nest and tried putting the nest back in the tree. I whacked the cat with my fireplace poker and put the dog in the house. Needless to say, the nest was a little worse for wear, since falling 6 feet onto a wooden deck tends to crack the mud on the bottom. I put it back where it was. It stayed but precariously. I decided I couldn't stay there for the next 2 weeks and keep the cat away, so.. armed with my trusty eagle beak clippers, I cut every branch I could reach off that tree. This neighbor only mows his grass once a month, so I'm pretty certain he won't notice. Now the cat can't get to them. Okay. Work done, right? Au contraire.
In 5 minutes, Mom Robin perched on the side of the nest and it fell out again. By now I'm not sure if the babies are alive or dead, but I decided to move the nest to a bigger tree where it would be safer. I placed it in the crotch of 2 branches and thought it was pretty safe. Not so.
The parents must have called the extended family, because now I have 8 robins swooping over my head and not one of them can figure out the new location of the nest. By the way, I just read an article about the fact that you shouldn't touch a baby bird because the parents will smell human, etc. It said that was an old wives' tale and not true. Good thing.
The bottom of that nest was almost non-existent by now, so my next solution was to put it in a plastic easter bucket and hang it in the tree.
It was wide enough for Mom Robin, so I thought she'd be grateful for the spiffy accomadations. No, she kept looking at it, but seemed to think it was too low. So I got my ladder and moved it higher.
She will set on a branch really close, trying to decide if she should set in it or not.
I decided I had done all I could do. They will either survive or not. They have fallen twice, changed locations 3-4 times and had the bejeebers scared out of them by cat breath only inches away. Who could blame them if they decided life just wasn't worth it?
We humans fall sometimes and hit the deck..hard. We change locations, have the breath of evil very close, but our heavenly Father always knows where we are and is never confused about a new location. Remember that when you consider giving up.
We humans fall sometimes and hit the deck..hard. We change locations, have the breath of evil very close, but our heavenly Father always knows where we are and is never confused about a new location. Remember that when you consider giving up.
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