Awareness Begins in Your Own Backyard
What was I missing before I read “What The Robin Knows” by Jon Young? A lot, it seems, based on what happened to me today, just a day after finishing the book.
It started as most things do, with me working in the backyard listening to one of my outdoorsy podcasts. Wild Ideas Worth Living is a great podcast if you are interested in things like: surf photography, sustainability, survival skills, getting kids outside, becoming a professional backcountry snowboarder, cultivating bravery, biking the Ho Chi Minh Trail (seriously), nutrition, climbing and living your life to the fullest by bringing your most extreme self to whatever you do. Those are actual podcast titles so it must be true.
The podcast I was listening to was an interview with Joel Van Der Loon - survivalist trainer and very nature aware guy. He isn’t a TV host (yet!) so he is still very much a true believer in his passion. There is a TV show in the works for the Discovery channel and I will be tuning in!
I was trimming trees and spreading some fertilizer (and probably picking up the fertilizer by dogs spread) while I listened to Joel talk about his favorite adventure tools and lessons. The interviewer asked him for a must read book and he mentioned “What the Robin Knows”. His cryptic description made it my next read.
Jon Young is excited about birds and their language (nerd alert!) and helping you become more aware of your surroundings (excellent) - this begins with finding a sit spot close enough to your backdoor that you can visit regularly. Your sit spot has many benefits beyond learning bird language as you might imagine.
He helps you understand not only the five basic bird sounds (songs, sweet companion calls, territorial aggression, annoying adolescent begging and a vast array of ALARMS! ), but also bird territory, energy conservation, hunting, and how to: train your senses, walk the walk, be invisible. Happily he interprets bird chatter and what it might mean, how you might not be getting the most from your trips into the woods and how you can begin to see, hear and observe much much more.
The book is enjoyable, funny and very insightful from beginning to end and there is a great online supplement that provides the very bird sounds Jon writes about within the chapters. This proved both invaluable to my understanding and annoying to my wife as we read at night before bedtime.
I learned about the “dawn chorus” and, critically, how to blend into the natural environment to become more aware of the baseline chatter of songs, companion calls and territory chatter. It is really only after you know what these sound like that you begin to really learn what is happening near your sit spot. After much practice you might be able to “predict” what or who is coming your way - be it humans “plowing” (his term) the birds and other animals toward you or hawks that may be cruising the sky above looking for a feathery snack.
My hope is that I will be more invisible and “plow” less. Invisibility can help reduce bird alarms that are, interestingly enough, not only interspecies but also interclass. Canaries, it would seem, are not only helpful in the coal mine but also the woody forest.
Squirrels pick up on the avian alarms. Deer, fox and weasels are attuned to bird alarms and if you are to see any of them (or the larger animals that pay attention to these alarmists) you have to learn how to blend into the environment. When the birds stop announcing your presence the woods reveal themselves more fully.
Alarms also create opportunities for those who may not have been the subject in the first place. The theory goes that if an accipiter (hawk or other bird of prey) hears an alarm the primary predator it may glide in that direction and catch a smaller animal distracted by the initial alarm. The little wren looking in the direction of an alarm now has a blind side that the hawk uses to its advantage. This may also explain why some prey animals have adapted to hunting at night when their movement won’t be announced by the Robin watching over the forest floor. All very fascinating and interconnected.
So what happened on my patio yesterday?
While reading Van Der Loon’s book I have been intentional about spending early mornings on our patio when I let the dogs out to do their thing. I used to mindlessly start my tea or fill their water bowls but these past few days I have been standing (invisible?) listening to the dawn chorus, picking out the individual bird songs and wondering what they may be saying about the coming sun and warmth.
By late morning yesterday I had been in the backyard and front yard several times, always listening for changes in the songs, alarms and territorial fights (I haven’t really figured those out yet).
I was trimming some dead limbs with a hand saw and checking out the onions in our garden. As I walked around the house I noticed there were no bird songs. None. It was completely silent. I couldn’t hear a bird within three streets. I stopped immediately and thought about what must be happening. Perhaps it was almost noon and the birds were just quietly feeding? Or maybe they were somewhere else? Songs and chatter die down as the sun rises and the day warms - or so I have read. But it wasn’t that warm.
In the backyard I looked up in the trees and to my great surprise there it was, a Coopers Hawk (or maybe a Sharp-shinned Hawk - I can’t tell them apart). And it had one of our yard birds in its talons. The little dead bird had red feathers but not dark red like a Robin.
I stared right at it and it at me. Then, in an instant, it was gone. I ran around to the front yard and there it was in the neighbors tree with its meal, again looking at me. I hadn’t been all that invisible as I came screaming around the corner of the house. (My better habits are just forming.)
What a great encounter. I had just read the chapters about alarms (and silence when a hawk or falcon is nearby) and how the birds respond and slowly recover the baseline. I watched the hawk for several minutes until a car came down the road and it flew north. Baseline slowly came back on line and I moved a little slower and more observant.
I hope to be more aware of my environment, listening with intention, seeing with softer eyes, and hopefully enjoying more of what nature offers. Next time I might see the hawk as it enters our airspace or the Robin as it alerts his neighbors to take cover.
If you are interested in being more entertained and educated in your backyard and having a better time when you are out on a hike or camping I recommend you pick up this book. You can find more about Jon Young’s message at the following links:
http://birdlanguage.com/author-jon-young/
http://birdlanguage.com/resources/bird-voices-audio-library/
http://www.wellreadnaturalist.com/2012/10/what-the-robin-knows/
I would love to hear/read your experiences with birds in the outdoors.