4 & 20 Blackbirds...

...baked in a pie?

I think not.

When I told friend in CS my tale of the starling show I saw the other day, he told me of a time when, as a boy, he asked his mother if she would bake a blackbird pie with ALL of the birds he could bring in. He had seen a large flock of blackbirds descending on their property, but he didn't tell her this. She said yes, so he set out with his shotgun. He said that he crept up behind a tree and BLOWWW! BLOWWW! (his words) As the story goes, he went out with a Piggly Wiggly bag and picked up more blackbirds than would fit in the bag (this was long enough ago that it had to be paper, not plastic). He took them back to the house and gave them to his mother, who was overwhelmed (my word, not his), but she baked him a blackbird pie. He described layers of bird breasts and dumplings... ewww

Now, I had just seen the starling spectacle, but was a little skeptical of his story, particularly when he told me some of them were red-winged blackbirds. I had my doubts that red-wing blackbirds would be amongst your regular, run of the mill blackbirds. So....

This morning I was sitting in my living room with the doors open where I could see thru the storm doors to my yard. Suddenly, a huge flock of birds started landing in the woods outside my house. A cacophony of bird calls filled my ears. I thought I was being visited by a flock of starlings. Cool! I grabbed my camera and ran outside.

I started trying to get some pics of the birds landing in the trees and on the ground. It was awesome! But, I realized fairly quickly, these weren't European starlings. No. They really were BLACKBIRDS. Within a few seconds after I started taking pics, they got spooked and took flight.

The sound was indescribable!! I've never heard anything like it! They took off directly over me.

I was taking pictures as fast as my little camera could handle it. I was standing just under the
edge of my porch and snapping as fast as I could.

Now, the cool thing is, once I took the pictures, I looked back and, sure enough, it looks like there are some red-winged blackbirds in the mix! If you'll zoom in on the pics you'll see what I mean.

I googled it this afternoon and sure enough, different types of blackbirds will migrate together. I had no idea. Interesting. And thought provoking. Wouldn't it be nice if humans could take some lessons from nature?

It was a wonderful experience and I'm thankfull to have had it.

God is wonderful.