A Carousel of Pygmy Nuthatches

Yesterday, I counted 13 Pygmy Nuthatches on one caged suet block–sending the feeder spinning like a carousel.

I love the positioning of my desk in front of the window facing our wild front yard and bird feeders. Every distraction is a source of inspiration or a tangent leading my thoughts in unexpected directions.

To properly honor nuthatches, I’ll begin with my poem–an invitation to become very small, agile, gregarious and perhaps to turn your world upside down–in a cheery way.

How to Become a Pygmy Nuthatch

Hang upside down
from a tree branch
by your three toes.

Shrink to pinecone size
like Alice in Wonderland,
“Curious and curiouser!”

Wear a plumbeous hooded
cape over your creamy honey
breast feathers.

Flip upright, sideways
crosswise all in one snap
of wind gust.

Fly in a blurred flurry. Join
a dozen of your kin
spinning on a suet feeder.

Squeak and trill in unison–
Wind chimes fluting through
frosty ponderosas.

Feel the earth’s magnetism
even as your needle-thin beak
probes for sustenance.

Turn on a dime. Peer
in every direction. Beware
the Sharp-Shinned Hawk.

Slumber at night packed tight
with your family tucked
in a tree cavity.

Embrace the acrobatic way
whirling, twirling, always
foiling gravity.

Turn up the volume and watch the twirling nuthatches. (If on a smart phone you may need to click on the website link).

As I write, my eyes are often tuned to the bird feeders swaying from a bodacious leafless lilac and a plum tree with a split trunk strapped together (last winter’s rescue effort). A heated water bath quenches the thirst of birds, as well as native Douglas and western gray squirrels. Framing my view are ponderosas–essential to the lives of Pygmy Nuthatches. I look to the wind-tossed treetops to measure the weather and the shadowed flight of a passing raven.

The more I attend, the more I see, like the arrival of a male White-headed Woodpecker! (always worthy of an exclamation point). Pygmy Nuthatches and White-Headed Woodpeckers flourish within ponderosa forests free of our chainsaw meddling and desire for what seems “beautiful” in the way of parks with evenly spaced trees without signs of dead branches, dead trees, or scruffy bushes, or disease. If we want these birds in our lives, we must learn to think of beauty from the perspective of nuthatches and woodpeckers.

Our garden lacks all symmetry yet to me? I see beauty in the tangles. Extending a third of an acre to the road are tall golden stalks leaning and crisscrossed. Sunflowers juggle brown seedheads. Goldenrods toss their lion manes. Purple asters bob fuzzy snowball seeds. Like crispy wings, the open seedpods of lupine radiate from stems.

Close to the soil, Idaho fescue bunchgrasses green up in the middle of this mostly mild December. Evergreen manzanita and ceanothus bushes extend sheltering arms for all who need to hide. Piled lava stones are home to lizards and chipmunks now tucked into dens and nooks.

*Our tousled habitat of a front yard–goldenrods in the foreground.*

When I feel saddened by news of the world, I turn to our little haven and the many gifts from offering a bit of reciprocity.

Looking through the window now, I can hear the faint high-pitched squeaks of nuthatches. When I go outside and stand very still, they will come within arm’s length. Always I marvel at their gregarious companionship–so different from the territorial Belted Kingfishers I tracked on Rattlesnake Creek.

From my sojourns with Belted Kingfishers, I learned to embrace my independent powers. Pygmy Nuthatches offer a way of living in companionship, in tight-knit families, and even communally raising their young. Both kingfishers and nuthatches are superb tenders of the next generation. As humans, we are at our best when we shine individually and act cooperatively–helping, tending, and caring for each other.

*Sharing the suet with a native gray squirrel is a bit challenging!*

As I wind up this blog on a Sunday eve, dusk falls at 4:25 pm. We’re edging ever closer toward the shortest day of the year–to winter solstice and the myth of the kingfisher and Halcyon Days–a time of peace and calm. A flock of eleven California Quail cluster for one last meal of fallen seeds on the wet, leafy ground where snow recently melted. The nuthatch flocks have flown to snuggle in tree cavities–maybe a dozen dozing to form a living down comforter. When temperatures fall, their metabolism slows.

What do nuthatches dream? Do they hear the hoots of Great-Horned Owls? Do they waken when winds pummel their home deep within the haven of a standing dead tree? When morning comes, do they spill out all at once?

And isn’t it wonderful to have so much wonder spinning like nuthatches on a carousel?