Right after I cleaned and refilled the bird bath, an assortment of magpies utilized the facilities. Not sure if this is the same bird in each photo, but I enjoyed watching their appreciation for the water.
December 19, 2021
It’s always a good day when Black-billed Magpies pay a visit.
I woke with anxiety (in large part exacerbated by the reality of the corporate, political, and media establishment rallying around the candidate who’s campaigning against Medicare for All during a pandemic) and knew I had to do something. Pull the covers over my head and remain in bed all day? Or get up and get moving?
I wisely chose movement and for the first time in weeks, went for a run. Well, a walk/run. For once, I was kind to myself and didn’t berate myself whenever I slowed to a walk. I went out on the trails in the open space and within minutes, I saw a bunny under a bush. I greeted it as I chugged on by and then a few minutes later, I spotted a talkative magpie perched on the water tank.
Black-billed Magpie in neighbor’s yard. August 29, 2019.
I’ve become accumstomed to being the only human out on the trails, but today I encountered a total of ten people and three dogs. I hope that if they also woke with anxiety, that their time in the open space soothed their souls. I know it did me a world of good.
January 3, 2018
I can’t even tell you how I (accidentally) achieved this weird photographic effect, but I can tell you why I’m using this photo from 2018. There’s currently a magpie calling in the tree outside my window, but I don’t want to get out the camera because I can’t bear to subject my eyes to more strain and pain from all the snow glare.
Instead, I offer this old photo that looks like a computer-generated rendering of a Black-billed Magpie.
Just one of the many dashing Black-billed Magpies that came around for the peanuts and suet we put out over the weekend. I cleaned and refilled the bath multiple times as birds splashed to keep clean and stay cool in this horrid heat wave. High-90 degree temperatures are much too high, especially for September.
Hope it was cooler in your neck of the woods!
There are many rhymes about magpies, but none of them is very reliable because they are not the ones that the magpies know themselves.
~ Terry Pratchett
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Magpies are a reminder that “dapper” is a good look.
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Tracy Abell 