I Know the Language of Birds

There was a moment I came to know the language of birds.

It was an unseasonably warm October. I spotted a black-capped chickadee that had latched onto the dried disc of dwarf sunflower, presumably probing for seeds. Curious, I approached to take a closer look, but he quickly flitted away.

With the bird gone, I investigated the dried sunflower head, wanting to know if the dwarf variety produced seeds like its more sizable cousin.

I was not 15 seconds into my study when a tiny feathered ball darted toward the very sunflower I’d been looking at. It was the same black-capped chickadee, but when he discovered me hovering over his sunflower, he stopped mid-flight and peppered me with a volley of high pitched pips and shrieks.

“What gives you the right?”—his sharp annoyance that I’d commandeered the source of his morning repast written all over his tiny bird face. Then he quickly turned, gave me the cold shoulder, and retreated back into the scrub oak.

Wow! I’d just been chewed out by an angry chickadee. And it took a second for me to realize his shrill upbraiding of my boorish manners hadn’t been spoken—but tweeted.

And yet, I’d understood the utterance perfectly.