When I’m out on the landscape, there is a lot of audio going on, from two stroke lawn care machines, leaves rustling in a breeze, and all the wonderful bird language. There is no soundscape more natural than birds- from singing to little companion chirps, birds fill our forests, hills, and neighborhoods with the music of life. It was interesting to see an NPR story about why birds sing that described their early morning dawn chorus as “racket”. That disturbed me, because bird song is (mostly) beautiful, and if we reflect on what a silent spring would mean, I hope to keep hearing birds throughout the day wherever I am.
Yesterday, I was walking to the back field where the sheep have been grazing for a few days. As I descended to the creek, I could hear a commotion of bird alarms in the forest, and watched as several small passerines scooted through the branched, chirping loud staccato notes. Other birds were hissing shrill squawks while juncos clicked like a person might cluck to a horse. The sounds were familiar to my ear, and I eagerly began spotting through the trees for a likely culprit to warrant such alarm. Something grey silently drifted off between leafy branches, away from my position, to the south, across the creek and up into another stand of red alders in the pasture where the sheep were grazing. I was not alarmed like the other birds, because this silent predator was not after my livestock. No areal predator threatened my sheep, and the chickens were far away to the north, back towards the house and barn. Who was I now searching for as I climbed up the other rise from the creek to the gate into the back field?
My herding dog Val, was looking around for what was causing the racket too, but she caught the scent of a rabbit and bounded off into the shrubs. I was looking upward, listening to the bird alarms and trying to see through thick foliage without tripping as I waded through tall grass and a few bracken ferns. I could now hear the more exotic cries of a western tanager, newly arrived for a brief summer hangout before returning to overwinter in Central America. I watched it land on a bowed branch and make a fuss, then my eye followed the branch and came upon what all the birds were so concerned with- and rightly so!
If the birds had not been alarming, and my ear had not picked up on the commotion, I would have missed this beautiful nature mystery. Noticing vocal changes in the bird language of a place will tell you what’s going on around you. I’ve been rewarded for listening to birds on many occasions, and still have a lot to learn. One time, robin alarms kept me safely distant from a cougar that was following a jogger just ahead on the trail. I found the jogger paused at a waterfall and let him know who else was in the woods with us. The robin let me know first, before I saw the fresh tracks and began trailing the big cat from a safe distance. I could hear the birds moving off with the lion through the thick woods, and knew to wait and stay well away until the alarms faded off into the woods.
My chickens use bird language, and will make specific alarm calls when they see certain sized objects in the air- like airplanes. They give a loud croak and look up at the sky. The whole flock will pick up on this call and look up, then they calmly move towards cover. My pup Valley has picked up on this alarm from the flock, and will growl or bark at what’s flying through above. Hawks, eagles, and accipiters have not hung around long when this cacophony goes off. It’s a fabulous build in protection for all the animals, and even the cats take notice, scurrying off under the house or into the grain room if the chickens start calling out warning. It takes the whole collective to stay alert, and the combines vigilance of both wild and domestic keeps the farm safe and sound. That, and putting away the chickens at night.
EEC Forest Stewardship 