Coming home to roost
March 15, 2017 1:41 PM Subscribe
The Ides of March isn't (aren't?) just known for stabbing. March 15th is also the day that the buzzards make their annual migration(link is from 2016) back to Hinckley, Ohio. How do they measure up against their more-famous avian cousins, the March-19th-migrating swallows of San Juan Capistrano? And will this year's snow storm keep them away?
Interesting! I didn't realize that "buzzard" was another word for "turkey vulture" (at least as it's used here). I've had a deep and abiding love for turkey vultures ever since I was a teenager living on the water in Florida - one year the red tide was particularly bad, killing fish like crazy. I am horrifically phobic of dead fish, so having them right there in my back yard was ... difficult ... but then the turkey vultures descended and cleaned away the fish! For me! My feathery heroes!
I can still see them, perching by the dozens on everybody's rooftops, silhouetted against the sky -
they really are magnificent creatures, one of my favorites, and I only wish I could get more merchandise featuring them. I would rock a turkey vulture t-shirt or bag so hard ...
posted by DingoMutt at 2:05 PM on March 15, 2017 [5 favorites]
I can still see them, perching by the dozens on everybody's rooftops, silhouetted against the sky -
they really are magnificent creatures, one of my favorites, and I only wish I could get more merchandise featuring them. I would rock a turkey vulture t-shirt or bag so hard ...
posted by DingoMutt at 2:05 PM on March 15, 2017 [5 favorites]
DingoMutt, you can download a couple of free coloring books devoted to vultures, courtesy of Hawk Mountain.
posted by MonkeyToes at 2:20 PM on March 15, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by MonkeyToes at 2:20 PM on March 15, 2017 [2 favorites]
they've been around kalamazoo for about 3 or so weeks - the people of hinkley must be pretending not to see them until mar 15
posted by pyramid termite at 3:40 PM on March 15, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by pyramid termite at 3:40 PM on March 15, 2017 [3 favorites]
Among the many things I never anticipated about my adult life is an interest in birds, but I have come to appreciate the turkey vultures, and to be glad for the company of my barn swallows. When I walk outside in the morning, I scan for the TVs, because if they're circling low, or are gathered in a small, dark herd in the field, then something has died, and I walk out to count barn cats and chickens and piglets. In springtime, those big old buzzards are a girl's best friend--environmentally-sound recycling for the dead groundhogs I find (the dog loses interest once he has killed them, so I can leave the carcasses out in plain view for the birds). I've seen them caught in a brief downpour; afterwards, they perch on the neighbor's swing set and spread out their wings to dry. It's eerie, but of course the poor things need to shed the water, and their slow ballet of turning themselves to the sun makes sense, too. The most discomfiting sighting was the day a dozen or so TVs lined up on another neighbor's roof--just this ominous portent of DOOM. (In fact, his donkey had died. The image has stuck with me, and I sometimes mutter to myself that oh shit, it's gonna be a vultures-on-the-roof kind of day.) Then there was the time I was out in the garden, and a TV flew by, low and slow, with a snake dangling from its beak. Motherfking snakes! In a motherfking beak! Different sort of day entirely.
The barn swallows, though...I'm not sentimental or superstitious, but when that first scout shows up, I smile, knowing that the universe has smiled. All summer long I leave the big barn door open so that they can come and go, building nests and crapping all over everything and I can't help it--I feel happy. The mud nests are everywhere in the rafters--I can't bring myself to take them down after the season ends, and they build new ones--and in the evenings, they congregate on the various extension cords strung beneath the ceiling. If I sit long enough and quietly enough, they'll come close, and we look at each other. It's a good relationship. They hate the dog, though. He'll sit outside the barn door and the swallows dive-bomb him, over and over, swooping close enough to ruffle his fur, and he snaps and misses and they fly back up to the wires, laughing. And the babies? I can hear them peeping before I can see them peek out over the nest edges. They are not cute. Their beaks are huge and their heads are baldy, with some down here and there. Somebody always falls out, and the lucky ones I scoop up and return to their mamas. When they start flying lessons, they make short trips, from bike handle to the wheelbarrow stave to the side of a red wagon. And then, soon, out the door. They are little miracles, all of them, the scouts, the parents, the wee ugly babies, and one day they are gone, like that, and the barn is quiet and still again. Harvest, winter, then the thaw and the first scout, coming back, coming home, flickering wings and a promise of return. Welcome back, I tell him, and I smile.
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:01 PM on March 15, 2017 [27 favorites]
The barn swallows, though...I'm not sentimental or superstitious, but when that first scout shows up, I smile, knowing that the universe has smiled. All summer long I leave the big barn door open so that they can come and go, building nests and crapping all over everything and I can't help it--I feel happy. The mud nests are everywhere in the rafters--I can't bring myself to take them down after the season ends, and they build new ones--and in the evenings, they congregate on the various extension cords strung beneath the ceiling. If I sit long enough and quietly enough, they'll come close, and we look at each other. It's a good relationship. They hate the dog, though. He'll sit outside the barn door and the swallows dive-bomb him, over and over, swooping close enough to ruffle his fur, and he snaps and misses and they fly back up to the wires, laughing. And the babies? I can hear them peeping before I can see them peek out over the nest edges. They are not cute. Their beaks are huge and their heads are baldy, with some down here and there. Somebody always falls out, and the lucky ones I scoop up and return to their mamas. When they start flying lessons, they make short trips, from bike handle to the wheelbarrow stave to the side of a red wagon. And then, soon, out the door. They are little miracles, all of them, the scouts, the parents, the wee ugly babies, and one day they are gone, like that, and the barn is quiet and still again. Harvest, winter, then the thaw and the first scout, coming back, coming home, flickering wings and a promise of return. Welcome back, I tell him, and I smile.
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:01 PM on March 15, 2017 [27 favorites]
Thanks, MonkeyToes - that vulture book is adorable! And there are TWO vulture books, an African one and a New World one! For the first time ever, I'm suddenly looking forward to my next long conference call at work ...
posted by DingoMutt at 5:26 PM on March 15, 2017
posted by DingoMutt at 5:26 PM on March 15, 2017
DingoMutt--further reading: The Vulture Chronicles. Fascinating stuff.
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:40 PM on March 15, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:40 PM on March 15, 2017 [1 favorite]
You may also be interested in this short interview with a vulture.
posted by Fuchsoid at 5:59 PM on March 15, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by Fuchsoid at 5:59 PM on March 15, 2017 [2 favorites]
I live just a few miles away and work for a paper that covers the area. Today was the buzzard sighting event, but this Sunday has more events, including the popular pancake breakfast at the elementary school and some stuff at the park a few miles away. Here's a piece previewing Buzzard Sunday and the event. Some history is at the end of the piece. I was told due to the high winds, the first buzzards weren't seen until early afternoon, which is very late.
posted by greatalleycat at 9:19 PM on March 15, 2017
posted by greatalleycat at 9:19 PM on March 15, 2017
Via my FB: Katie Fallon's new book is Vulture: The Private Life of an Unloved Bird.
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:54 PM on March 17, 2017
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:54 PM on March 17, 2017
Epic poetry learned at my mother's knee:
"The buzzards of Hinckley are back on their ledges
All ugly and wrinkly,
Their eyes glowing pinkly,
They perch on the hedges.
Their feathers unruly,
Their beaks dripping cruelly,
Repulsive and droolly –
Their claws bloody wedges
With flesh on the edges!"
[possibly more lost to the mists of time? ...]
"Horrible, hideous
Filthy perfidious
Hawks undeserving a haven!
I'd be more of a booster
for a rooster in Wooster
Or a raven in Avon."
Very few online transcriptions exist but there's one here.
posted by nonane at 12:59 PM on March 31, 2017 [2 favorites]
"The buzzards of Hinckley are back on their ledges
All ugly and wrinkly,
Their eyes glowing pinkly,
They perch on the hedges.
Their feathers unruly,
Their beaks dripping cruelly,
Repulsive and droolly –
Their claws bloody wedges
With flesh on the edges!"
[possibly more lost to the mists of time? ...]
"Horrible, hideous
Filthy perfidious
Hawks undeserving a haven!
I'd be more of a booster
for a rooster in Wooster
Or a raven in Avon."
Very few online transcriptions exist but there's one here.
posted by nonane at 12:59 PM on March 31, 2017 [2 favorites]
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posted by peeedro at 2:01 PM on March 15, 2017 [1 favorite]