I’m pretty easy-going most of the time. I don’t tend to take things amiss. Still and all the same, there are things I believe friends should not do to each other. To take an example, I do not think friends should poop on each other’s heads.
Our personal crows, currently numbering four, are definitely our friends. We have a whole routine that involves swooping and chuckling and general conversation. Someone might land on the gutter and someone might toss a peanut. If we go for a walk we are greeted effusively when we come back. If we don’t notice our friends right away one of them will dip low in front of us at chest height. As a more or less direct result, I find two or three peanuts in the washer drum after every load of laundry I do. Our crows do not mind them pre-rinsed. It saves them the trouble of sludging up the bird baths every day with debris.
And so it was I did notice the main swooper, DooDah, whacket her way up to the power line, and I looked up at her and asked her if she wanted a peanut—I knew perfectly well she did, and it’s not that I think she should have to ask, but yeah, it kind of is—and we had a little back and forth and then I felt an unmistakable bloop and a creamy slithering on top of my head. Courtesy of Dickens, who was apparently directly above me.
Birds strafe Dave rather often. They’re not all the super judges of character they’re made out to be. They’re aggravated by his height. But it had been a long time since that had happened to me. Which is odd, because there are a lot of birds in the world, and not a single one of them is backed up. Birds are savants about pooping, even the ones who favor processed Frankenfoods from the Burger King parking lot.
Most animals are adept poopers. Even wombats, who poop cubes, never seem to get a corner of a turd hung up. I am told domestic felines may suffer from constipation or even obstipation, which is constipation so severe that the cat may develop a single petrified and stationary turd the entire length of the colon, which is fortunately not as big a deal as it was with Elvis Presley, who had a longer colon and a worse diet and probably some things to atone for. Dogs, on the other hand, usually have little such difficulty even though their diet might include random dead things, cat vomit, rubber toys, and an overcoat, although they might appreciate a little tug on the sleeve as it emerges.
Birds are fine.
But I thought Dickens was my friend, and counted on him to follow the first rule of friends: Don’t poop on your friends.
My first cat, (Saint) Larry, never had any digestive issues to speak of, unless you count a propensity for dropping a dookie wherever she happened to be when it the mood struck, and this was more of a housekeeping issue than a digestive issue. She did, however, fart. You never heard it. You just became aware, while she was on your lap, of an encroachment in the air space, a sudden tiny olfactory intrusion on your serenity, an ephemeral fug that passed into oblivion just as quickly. “What’s the matter?” Dave would ask, when my face pleated up.
“Larry…relaxed,” I’d say.
That’s what she did. She wasn’t pushing an agenda. Her sphincter just loosened up. She was radiating contentment. All over.
I think that’s what happened with Dickens, too. I certainly don’t think he meant anything by it. I like to think that the whole Dickens and DooDah clan is relaxed around us.
Just not above us.
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A note for dear Amy, who’s sick with the cooties:
We send all our love, and a buttload of Pootie’s.
I can only speak for Parrots, but birds seem to have a tendency to poop when they are excitedly anticipating something, or if they are going to take off (it lightens the load.) Maybe Dickens was anticipating a flight down to retrieve a nut, especially as he’d need to beat Doo-Dah to it. I’d give him the benefit of the doubt.
On a side note, my Grey, Max, seems to think that food is ALWAYS better when it’s pilfered from someone else’s dish. He and Mikey (my Mealy Amazon) could have the exact same things in their dish. But he will hold out on eating from his own dish until Mikey is finished and goes into the other room or onto the porch. Then he will gobble her leftovers before getting to his own stuff. Probably works for Crows as well, since they are opportunistic. And also, when we go out, so give our birds an “early dinner” in their dishes, Max and Petey (our yellow-nape) will immediately start chowing down. Mikey waits until we actually get back to eat. I tend to think she is more of a “prepper.” “Well, the monkeys may not come BACK from dinner,” she thinks. “I’d better ration this… just in case.”
He’s got the benefit of the doubt when it comes to intention. Some birds poop right before taking off, some (like hawks, I think) poop just after taking off, and all of them poop all of the time, so you can probably find a pattern anywhere.
Especially on my car. I can tell MY black Nissan Altima from the myriad others parked in my vicinity in a parking lot by the poop pattern on it. (Lots of trees… lots of birds… lots of bird poop.)
I park under a power line. I haven’t washed my car in years. The paint is fleeing.
Relaxation Happens
!!!
Just remember to keep your mouth closed when you look up.
Learned that one. Also? When you see a huge pile of bird poop, no matter how curious you are, don’t…
Sorry about the extra shampooing you had to accomplish. It’s been 70 years since the one/only incident that I had. I was 14 years old and on a birding outing with the Burrough’s Nature Club of KCMO. Fortunately, it was a small bird. Like Ogden Nash, I’m glad that cows can’t fly.
That would be Pie in the Sky, wouldn’t it?
The only thing that has ever pooped on me was a newborn baby who just sort of “exploded” as I lowered her into the bath.
I’ve heard those things can go off at any time.
As we were walking from the front door to the car, my young baby was sitting on top of my head when she exploded. She turned 41 yesterday and doesn’t do that anymore.
Well, thank goodness for THAT! It’s bad enough picturing that scenario when she was a baby… but now would just be disturbing on SO many levels.
I’m thinking you never had her on top of your head after that one time.
Among the “highlights” of my life…I can claim to have been shat upon by a Wedge Tail eagle. (And many other birds and animals, but a Wedgie is a biggie.For those who like to keep a tally.)
I DO like to keep a tally! Good on you! All mine have been ordinary poopers.
I’m impressed with how thick and lustrous your hair is.
It’s that … conditioner.
According to U of Florida, vultures poop on themselves to keep cool. I’m having trouble picturing how that would work. Everybody seems to agree that they barf as a defensive mechanism, but I don’t know if that’s barfing ON the attacker or just barfing on the ground when cornered, which, I’ve read, is astoundingly stinky. All I know from personal experience is that a great gob of vulture poop messed up the paint on our car pretty badly, though we had done nothing (so far as I know) to offend. But maybe I don’t know what a vulture considers insulting.
Yes. They poop on their feet. One of the reasons banding them on their legs is a bad idea. Also? I believe there have been some studies that show red cars are pooped on more than any other color car.