Tuesday, November 28, 2017

They Arrived Uninvited

Rossini wrote an opera entitled The Thieving Magpie, named after that bird’s kleptic propensities. I think the subject of the opera lives near me. Every couple of days, since I began leaving food out for the community cats, the food-bowl has been emptied. I thought that I had some very hungry animals in my neighbourhood. I do, but they aren’t mammals.


The solution is simple, of course. I will put the food-bowl out in the evening, when the magpies are sleeping off their reiving, and the cats are prowling. The only time I have seen cats actually eating the nutrition I’ve offered has been at night, so they know it’s there at that time. I will bring in the food each morning.

But I think I may scatter some kernels for the magpies, regardless. Though they are rather aggressive toward other birds, even driving them out of districts by eating their eggs, they do provide a bit of entertainment for my beasts, and I believe in paying performers for their work. But I won’t give them too much. They’ll just end up stealing what they want, anyway.

10 comments:

  1. I am careful with putting food out for The 'O' Cats, because we don't want to encourage raccoons, rats, opossums, etc. As if...PO'M eats up everything anyhow; he's a little glutton. We don't have magpie's around here, that I know of!

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  2. You know, I don't think I've ever seen one in "real" life. At least your kindness is helping an abundance of critters! :-)

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  3. Yes, feeding only after dark will probably be the best solution. The magpies annoy me because they drive everything away and make such a screeching noise all of the time.

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  4. Uninvited guests are always a problem when you leave food out. But being an animal lover, I'm all for feeding the wildlife. And as you noted, the cats love watching bird TV.

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  5. Glad we don't have these near me , but I am sure other birds would do the same.

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  6. I found it terribly frustrating to try to feed, say, the birdies. I spent a lot of green papers to buy sunflower hearts to keep Katie and Admiral's channel up and running. The hearts were disappearing at an amazing rate. I found that it was all of my deer who just cake this town with their presence. They are everywhere. I live in a wooded area and the deer are in the streets, your yard..etc. They even walk down the sidewalks! I did not put two and two together on the disruption of the TV channel out there until I looked out to see what was on TV one meowning, and saw two does with their tongues stuck into my 5 pound capacity bird feeder, scarfing up all the sunflower hearts. They would eat a good 9 #'s a week. I thought it was hungry birds. I had to give up. (trees are too huge and tall to put a feeder in the limbs...limbs aren't attainable as they start 40 or so feet up.

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  7. You never know who will turn up at the food table - often the greediest are those uninvited. I think you have a good solution. Raccoons take everything here - including food intended for the community cats.

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  8. Darn magpies! I agree that feeding the cats at night is more likely to work best...those birds are just scavengers. I guess they have their place in nature.

    Eileen

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  9. we keep our feral cat bowls in our garage, but they do seem to be empty more often in the morning that in the evening.

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  10. One of my favorites and they have been here at times seeing what they can grab MOL

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