Morning Chorus

Where my backyard is usually festooned with currawongs, bullying all the other smaller fry out of what they consider ‘their’ territory, the magpies have returned. They’re always around of course, but there are more of late, family groupings I imagine, and I watch through the study window as they go about their daily business, pecking around to see what morsels are just below the surface, ever watchful of where they are and their own safety.

 

I’m no naturalist by any means, for my knowledge of the wonders of the natural world has probably mainly been ingested courtesy of one David Attenborough, the master of nature documentaries. I rarely go hunting for information on the life cycles of insects, the mating habits of sloths or the complexity of the underworld connection between trees and fungi, even though that’s one subject close to my heart. Somehow, information seeps in through watching and listening, not only via media and books, but through simple observation, and when something piques my interest, that’s when I like to delve deeper.

 

My ears pricked up when I heard on a radio interview recently that magpies ‘talk’ in sentences. Birdsong greets us each morning, a tweet here, a chirp or twitter there, all in languages unknown to me, but when the magpies join in, ah, there’s no mistaking that wake-up call. Their distinctive melodies ring true and are so synonymous with the Australian landscape. I wondered whether the English magpies sing the same song, or whether it sounds a little different because of the Pommie accent, but found that along with their American magpie cousins, they are an entirely different species. With the only noticeable similarity their black and white plumage, they are smaller, quite different in appearance and related to crows and jays, while the Aussie variety are more closely related to currawongs and butcherbirds.

 

Which got me thinking. Crows and currawongs look so alike you’d think they were closely related, for we have plenty around here, and ever since watching Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds in my early teens I haven’t trusted a crow since. The currawongs can look almost as intimidating with that prominent powerful beak of theirs, but they don’t tend to give you the once over with a look of disdain so typical of crows who I’m sure see themselves as superior and therefore regard us mere mortals as not worthy of consideration. An internet search will send you on a whole other rabbit hole to go down on that subject if you’re so inclined, but I’m digressing for I’m far from where I was originally heading.

 

In her brilliant debut novel Where the Crawdads Sing, set in the North Carolina marshlands, Delia Owens observed

 

Birds sing mostly at dawn

because the cool, moist air of morning

carries their songs and their meanings much farther.

 

And from Maggie Mackellar’s exquisitely written Graft, set on Tasmania’s east coast during a year of drought

 

A family of magpies is singing.

The sound is so pure it almost hurts.

 

Is that why an early morning bushwalk lifts your spirits even more when accompanied by the magpie’s chorus? There’s something so joyous about it, and I’ve often wondered whether they’re just happy to greet the new day or whether the trills and warbles going up and down the scale have more meaning. It seems my thoughts were on the right track, for recent research suggests they have a language all their own, not as complex as humans obviously, but when combined in particular ways their vocal range of sounds are somewhat akin to sentences. Apart from alerting each other to any impending danger and staking out their territory, I wonder what they chat about while they peck around the yard. 

‘Hey Fred, ya wanna go check out the yard next door?’

‘Nah, you go, I’m pretty right.’

‘Ew, what’s that you got? That’s not a worm. THIS is a worm.’

 

Baby maggies learn individual sounds in much the same way as humans, increasing their vocabulary over time until they too can converse on a par with their parents. I have to admit I’ve witnessed them in their juvenile stages following aimlessly after their mothers going ‘Wah I’m hungry’ ‘Wah slow down’ ‘Wah you said you’d get me breakfast’ ‘Wah I’m hungry’ ‘Wah Ma Wah’ to which their harassed mothers would walk a little faster and turn around with an annoyed ‘Go get your own, you’re not a baby anymore.’ Which is true, for they grow quickly and it’s not always easy to distinguish a young one from the adults. Strutting around the yard they may look self-sufficient, but they’re still dependent on their parents for the first few months before striking out on their own and doing their own foraging. Mum and Dad have it all worked out, for they know when the time is right to give the kids a little shove towards independence.

 

The natural world may have its rich beauty, but the animal kingdom can be a violent place, as for many it’s eat or be eaten out there. Each and every species have their own way of protecting themselves and their newborn, of warning when the enemy is near. Springtime nesting season for magpies can spell danger, not only for them but for anything on however many legs remotely near their nests. The infamous habit of swooping during this time has sustained many an injury upon poor unsuspecting pedestrians and cyclists who dare to traverse a magpie’s favourite park or patch of bush. They have impeccable memories; they’ll know if you were the person who yelled at them last year and flapped your arms this way and that to ward them off. Come this year, they’ll be waitin’ for you. 

 

On the flip side, if you befriend them, they remember that too. My son and his dog frequented a Sydney dog-walking park, famous for its marauding magpies, but they were patient. They stood still, were quiet, and over time a particular bird would frequently visit them as they went on their daily walk, skirting around them, checking them out, probably wondering what the curious sounds were coming from the two-legged creature. The interaction obviously allayed its fears, for their conversations continued over the years.

 

For anyone who has read Penguin Bloom, the true story of Sam Bloom whose near fatal fall while on an overseas family holiday left her paralysed, one orphaned magpie instigates an unforgettable transformation for a traumatised family navigating their new reality. One of her sons finds an injured magpie chick, naming it Penguin because of its black and white plumage, and as they nurse it back to health, a parallel healing process runs alongside it as the family comes to terms with the nature of Sam’s injury and upheaval of their family life. The movie adaptation is also excellent, highlighting the power this unusual relationship between two broken creatures has in order to face extreme adversity and come through it with resilience and hope. The bird becomes part of the family, with Sam’s early reluctance to engage in the bird’s welfare culminating in the realisation that the guardian angel that saved my life was a baby bird.

 

For the family, Penguin constantly reminded us that we are all part of nature. And the more connected with nature we are, the happier we feel.

 

Who’d have thought the humble Aussie magpie could be such a catalyst for change. How caring for the fragility of one could produce a spark of life and glimmer of hope in the other, and a sense of wholeness to both.

Photos courtesy of:

1.Thea Harrison

3. Don Ricardo

4. Jack McCracken