Put A Bird On It

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Your AI-free reminder that you can find or create joy while also feeling fear, rage, despair, and other prickly crap.

Necklace by Tatty Devine, stuffy by Wild Woolies

My dermatologist complimented me on my tit yesterday. I was pleased she noticed, as it’s a favorite. The tit in question is a Eurasian blue, on a necklace made by jewelry designer, Tatty Devine. The dermo asked if I was a bird person.

I wasn’t sure how to answer her.

I’m a bird person insomuch as I have a bird page-a-day calendar. I save the pictures to use in collages, since tossing the images or consigning the backsides to scratches of random shopping lists or my tortured arithmetic disrespects the majesty of these tiny perfect creatures.

I’m a bird person insomuch as Husband and I have a mis-matched collection of quirky bird art, mostly of the stuffie variety (NOT TAXIDERMIED!). This includes a felted Belted Kingfisher and hummingbird from a holiday gift exchange that could’ve gotten messier if those wild woolies didn’t come home with me.

I’m a bird person insomuch as our personal library boasts a few different bird identification books from various places we lived or traveled to. Truthfully, the pages aren’t too ruffled. We have bird watching glasses, but always forget to use them. The bird feeder is always stocked.

I’m a bird person insomuch as the Merlin app is on my phone’s favorites screen and gets more use than Shazam. And I get really pissed off when I’m sitting outside trying to listen to the birds and all I can hear is the drone of leaf blowers. I also have several birdsong stations cued up in my streaming service. My singing bird clock’s hourly chirps have not aligned with the correct bird since the first time I changed the time on it. I don’t love it any less.

I’m a bird person insomuch as I get insanely jealous when I read about people who have befriended the crows in their neighborhood and take part in a gift exchange with them. I am not a squirrel person because they steal any crow gifts I’d leave out. (And also there are no crows in my neighborhood).

I’m a bird person insomuch as I will stop in the forest to listen to and record birdsong. Sitting at a campsite last week I listened as the song of one small bird filled the entire forest. I will never cease to be amazed at how such a small creature can create such an enormous sound. The eastern wood peewee (thanks Merlin), weighs less than half an ounce or roughly the equivalent of a small strawberry. And yet makes such a huge sound. I can only imagine the ruckus a family of dinosaurs, those giant bird ancestors, could’ve blasted out. Fun fact: they probably sounded nothing like what Jurassic Park would have you believe.

I’m a bird person insomuch as I love birds. I love watching, feeding, looking at, listening to, and generally appreciating them. I love bird art and imagery.

But I’m not a Bird Person™. I can identify very few birds as they land on my feeder, can’t match their call with their name or what they look like. To be a Bird Person™, as officially recognized by other Bird People™, you must have The Knowledge.

There are over 11,000 species of birds. The males and females look different from one another, so that makes 22,000 different birds to know on sight. And of course each bird has more than one call. It’s not enough to know these individual ditties. You have to match the various songs to the species name and how each gender appears. I still struggle with metric conversions, I’m not sure my brain is willing to undertake the assimilation of this much more information.

It’s more than that brain full of info, Bird People™ keep meticulous notes on their experiences. They have extraordinary dedication, constantly expanding on their bird search. It’s like trading Pokemon with the universe, but instead of fictional pocket-sized monsters, the search is for tiny flying creatures with a tendency to be skittish and hide in trees. Their aim is to amass as many different bird-sightings as possible. More than merely the ability to recite every bird they’ve ever seen, Bird People™ know exactly what ticks they need to fulfill their life list and will quest hard for it. I have so much respect for the high nerd level of Bird People™, but I cannot match that energy.

I’m sure Bird People™ couldn’t give two hoots about my so-called bird love. Theirs is a competitive culture, and I am whatever the opposite of that is: someone who finds so much joy and delight in how I interact with birds. I don’t want to gamify it, nor create a system of wanting more, of constantly chasing the next twittering dopamine hit. I do not feel compelled to claim ownership or dominion over the species I’ve seen or heard. Not a single one of my dozen or so active notebooks/sketchbooks/journals are dedicated to chronicling avian adventures.

My peeps, this is the garden I will tend: it is possible to be a bird person, to love birds, to revel in their song and the brief flash of wings and color, to toss them scraps of french fries, without an in-depth knowledge of what they are called and when I have seen them before. Sure, it’s a bonus if you can wing it and name a few of your avian neighbors, but my feathers won’t get ruffled for lack of technical knowledge. Bird joy can be as simple as indulging in the curious magic that is birdsong while not giving a flock about the accumulation and dissemination of its expertise.

So, yes, I am a bird person, and I really love my little blue tit.

I sat on this bench while I made the following recording. The hedgerow was full of birds singing their tiny hearts out. I walked along for quite a ways, listening to their madness, and never saw so much as a single beak or feather, they were tucked so tidily away in the shrubbery.

Biddestone, UK, June 2023

I pulled over on my way home from work in Savannah, GA to honor this roosting ritual, July 2022.

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words and images © Rubi McGrory 2021-2026