The Cowbird Quartet

In my post a few weeks ago about cowbirds I indicated that they were not the nicest of birds based on the mother’s life style, specifically her nesting habits.  Later I got to thinking about it and wondered who am I to judge.  I mean who am I to apply my homo sapiens standards to wild animals.  Tennyson probably provided one of the best (at least the most succinct)  descriptions of one aspect of nature when he said it is “red in tooth and claw”.  If I’m going to apply a human moral judgement to wild animals wouldn’t it be fair to ask is the cowbirds’ nesting behavior any worse than me having scrambled eggs for breakfast?

We could go on forever with this train of thought (at least I could) but I really don’t want to.  Instead in this post I’m going to look at some cowbirds with my big ol’ 80-400mm (120-600mm equivalent) anthropomorphic lens.  This time though I’ll focus the lens on a more pleasant behavior.

 

 

When I first saw this gathering I wondered (based on the known despicable behavior of female cowbirds) what nefarious activity they were up to.   Sure, that’s profiling but I can’t help it.  I have lots of “good birds” in the area I want to protect.

 

Imagine my surprise and embarrassment when they lined up and started singing (in harmony) Shine on Harvest Moon.  This just goes to show that one should not be too quick to judge.

 

 

 

 

Thanks for stopping by.  And remember, maybe we should not be too judgemental with regard to brown-headed cowbirds.

David

All photos taken with a Nikon D7100 and a Nikkor 80-400mm telephoto zoo.