darling starling
Image by emdot
This morning I did a very non-emdot type of thing. I went to the grocery store right when it opened.
I didn’t mean to. I mean, I was going to go to a different grocery store (Scolaris, or as KB and I like to call it, Scolarlar) that opened at normal hours, thus would have been open for awhile before I got there.
But I was out of coffee and I really wanted some French Roast, and for that I typically go to Traders because you can git a boatload of French for about 10 smackers.
My car clock is set ahead about 7.5 minutes because it runs fast and I’m notoriously late, so I figure, why set it back? It’ll just be fast again and anyway this way I can trick myself for being on time.
But for some reason I forgot to use car-clock math when I checked the time and thought "oooh, Trader’s is opening right now." Only I got there 7.5 minutes early. And that’s embarrassing. Standing outside the locked doors with the rabid early morning grocery shoppers and all.
But I did what I had to do, cuz, c’mon: coffee was involved.
Anyhow. Finally they open the doors and the early morning crowd push their way in and right about that time I hear a very interesting bird song.
A bird song I’d never heard before. But lord knows if I could imitate it now or even tell you what it sounded like. Alls I know is that it was a different bird song to me. It sounded somehow intelligent, even. And me, being a very non-impressive but interested street-type of birder, looked up into the Trader Joe’s rafters to see if I would be lucky enough to spy the little singer.
And there he was. Proud. Immodest. Blatant. Perched. Singing boldly. Brashly. As if it made perfect sense that he lived on top of the Trader Joe’s T.
About the size of a robin (maybe just a smidge smaller), dark and seriously speckled this guy sang with the bravado of a mocking bird.
I’ve tried to look him up online, but to no success. He’s a bit wren-like, except that he is very dark. And he seems to big to be a songbird, but sing he did.
Does anyone know what he is?
(And just in case you were wondering, as soon as I walked into TJs I realized I needed way more than coffee, so spent an hour and a hundred dollars. Also ran into Nick B. who drove to LA after Katrina to rescue family and got to hear his crazy story "I’ve never had so many guns pointed at me in my life!!" And also experienced grumpiest checker in the world who I swore pitched my groceries into their prospective bags with masochistic checker glee.)
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29 responses to darling starling Images
Looks like a starling from over here…
A T-Bird?
ooof! james. of course you are perfectly correct. and its brazen personality fits a starling as well.
we don’t get as many starlings here as mockingbirds. so that will be my excuse to not being able to ID such a common bird.
there is a flickr birder who HATES starlings with a passion. but i kind of like them. they’re sassy and brazen.
cuibel — don’t i wish. those new t-birds are very cute.
Don’t mind starlings either – I quite like their swaggering gait and the iridescence of their plumage. Works well with the graphic nature of the sign he’s (she’s?) perched on.
Captured it to a T
ha.!
ha ha ha!
i just got it. /me smacks forehead.
T-bird.
Cuibel — so so clever! S-moo, thank god you came around to clear that up. (by saying captured to a t)
Good lord. I better have another cup of coffee. I’m working in slo-mo today.
(This is a european starling, so not native to the states and quite aggressive and so many people stateside hate them).
Yep, don’t mess with those european starlings — the gang members of the bird world.
mmm, who wasn’t paying attention then?
starlings
Lots of people hate starlings, but I’ve always loved them and their inimitable songs. Ironically they’re hated in Vancouver for pushing out another introduced species – the myna bird.
Pierre
that would explain the bandanas and rap music.
groc — i definitely wasn’t paying attention.
but you know, just based on its personality i should have been able to identify it.
oh, the starling hater is devious desperado. he’s got some awesome bird shots.
pierre, my friend says that starlings also mock, so i call them mock-mockingbirds or mock-squared. the myna is native to canada?! who knew?
a grumpy checker at Trader Joe’s – that’s worse than a starling
so true l&f! so very true.
Poor M., so harried by comments she misreads
Pierre
oh my god, i have the EXACT same situation with my car clock for the EXACT same reasons. as I get older, it is easier and easier to trick myself, it seems.
oh and a lovely starling, lovely story. lovely all around.
There are some neighborhoods in Vancouver where these busy birds positively fill the trees! I’ve always liked starlings but, then, I love crows and ravens too.
Nice story!!
Starlings are the most incredible pests. In the midwest they sometimes form flocks numbering in the tens of thousands; the noise is astonishing and amount of bird shit…well, you really don’t want to walk under the trees they take over.
What’s cool, though, is they were introduced in the US about a century ago by some deranged New York industrialist who wanted Central Park to have all of the songbirds mentioned in Shakespeare. He brought over something like 50 pairs and released them in the park…and now the little buggers are lurking about at Trader Joe’s in SLO town.
Pretty voice, though.
darling starling Images
Starlings are the one bird with the strength of their bill in the opening of it. If you watch them on a lawn for instance they pierce the ground with their closed pointed beak then seperate them to pry open a hole in the ground.
pierre, damn. yep. yer right. myna birds are like an ornithology mystery to me. such a strange animal.
see, et, i’m telling you. separated by birth and a whole mess of years. but still.
bosque, i can’t ever remember seeing these in flocks. which of course means in the next week i’ll see them seven times in huge, roving flocks of hoodlumesque birds.
merci, luc.
greg, i’m both fascinated aby the starling and worried about its quest and probable victory towards world domination. the song, i tell you… just don’t listen to it. it’s too lovely. too brazen. too bold. too enticing. la la la la la i can’t hear it.
i KNEW stonebird would have the answers or at least the interesting tidbit. stoney, you’d better be a teacher or a prof. i’ll be disappointed if you aren’t.
darling starling Images
what a fun class to start my morning with, thanks y’all profs out there under the T. i don’t know much about birds, but if parrots can survive brookln (and winter) they might be the next manifest destinyers.
Enjoyed your story and comments above.
I actually used to own a mynah bird when I was a kid.
Jeez, that Greg knows everything!!!
I’m still shocked there was a rude checker at Trader Joe’s! I am always so impressed at how great they are at customer service.
On Starlings……I got nothin’.
good point, bean. now would be a good time to bring up the thug squirrels that live outside your fire escape. you should name that one don corleone. (i prolly spelled that wrong, but am feeling particularly lazy, so no dictionary.com checking).
thanks mizz foot.
pictures please grocko!
lynnie, true true. he’s a walking encyclopedia who doesn’t walk but types and types and types. he’s a typing encyclopedia, which is a smart idea in and of itself.
darling starling Images
I have to admit, the first thing that came to mind was Clarice. ;^) But sassy birdsongs…yes, good, love them. Especially when they happen far from my bedroom window. Before my son was born, we had a mockingbird that woke us every morning at 4:00 a.m. — loved the sound during the day, but not that early in the day. So does this mean you’ll be going to the store earlier in order to hear the sounds and see the sights? I think repeated doses of emdot should soften up that grumpy checker, anway.
darling starling Images
A Starling call always looks like it requires great effort. Like they can barely get it out.
Ah a touching thing, Emdot with the munchies. I can just picture this moment….. ok there it is. No clue with the birdie, here we have mostly seagulls,ravens and so.
Hey I love this!! I have a family of starlings living above my window and they’re BRUTAL!!! My landlord’s screened over the hole with double-super-extra-strength-ply-screen (or whatever it was) twice! and they rip through it like it’s toilet paper to set up house again…they’re very pretty though and i read they mimic every other bird call around…something like 100 bird calls all at once…which is what that incredible song is coming out of their little beak
I’m dying to get pics of the parrots living wild in san francisco…now THAT’S alot of noise…the first time i heard them it scared the crap out of me!!
Aside from all my babbling..this is a really nice pic…i like all the color and the composition too
darling starling Images
garrinn, please post photos of ravens. i love them. you can keep the seagulls.
kday — funny stories. we don’t have as many starlings here, but i guess it’s just a matter of time.
i love the troublemaking birds, i think.
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