Learning with Cactus Wrens

For Elizabeth Taylor

You only see the birds that let you see them –

I’m embarrassed. After 6 AM, on my dawn walk, I pass the haunted house getting refurbished, pickups parked out front. Coming up on my left, a tangle of mesquite, dense and tall. At the top of the mesquite, a big thrasher sings, chortles. Thrashers, related to mockingbirds, display quite the repertoire. I stop. I’m close to the thrasher. Eye to eye. I start talking, offering my full range of chirps, chups, toks, whirrs. I get out my worms and distribute a handful. Right away, a threesome of cactus wrens flutter in, hopping in the mesquite, talking and chupping, too. I step back, walking backwards so I can keep an eye on them coming down for worms. I continue walking backwards, and I can see – I realize the pickup across from me, down a little ways, has 2 guys sitting upfront, their eyes glued to me. Big eyes, mouths open. Birds’ eyes, ears, noses are better than ours. Thrasher and cactus wrens, now on the ground at the side of the road, enjoy a tasty wormy breakfast, but I think sometimes they find being watched annoying. 

Everyone has a cactus wren story.

My neighbor stepped out to see what I was doing in front of his house. I was talking to cactus wrens and leaving mealworms for them. Immediately, my smiley neighbor told his story: he’d had a very healthy, very productive chiltepin bush in his backyard. He loved their tiny chiles that looked like red beads. They had a distinctive flavor and heat. But his guts rebelled, so he hadn’t been picking them like he used to. Then, the cactus wrens discovered the bright red and orange, delectable beads, and they ate all of them, then they ate the bush. Or, at least, they literally disassembled it. I wonder how they learned the small chiles were edible – and tasty. I guess they check out everything.

A birder buddy related how he was watching his bird feeders in the front yard from his porch, and saw a pair of cactus wrens come in to reconnoiter. They had little interest in seed feeders or nectar feeders. Occasionally, they checked out the suet. He lived at a high elevation, a wooded canyon, not typical habitat for cactus wrens. He only saw them a few times a year. The 2 visitors were on the ground investigating an informal pile of yard debris – log, sticks, leaves, mulchy stuff. They found what they were looking for: feathers! Somebody had lost a bunch of feathers, and the feathers had blown in to the debris. The feathers had to be carefully extracted. It took several trips for the cactus wrens to collect what they needed, flying away with a beakful of feathers. Whose feathers? A white winged dove’s? For a nest? Or a project?

Another neighbor recounted how when she was raking in her yard, cactus wrens followed behind her, running after her in odd little dashes. In that odd bird gait on the ground. The ground gait! Legs and feet know they’re for more than branch work and hopping. A certain high stepping staccato to that gait. Who knows what delectables would be uncovered by raking?

I took an afternoon mosey and saw up ahead on the telephone wire a disheveled female Cooper’s Hawk. Like she’d been tossed! Mugged! Across the street, atop another telephone pole, a Swainson’s Hawk in full grandeur, in full disdain. To add to the female Cooper’s Hawk’s humiliation, a party of cactus wrens were in the mesquite directly below her, chupping away. Carrying on! Brave in their protected position. I stopped by the tree. I joined in, rasping, chupping as best I could. The Cooper’s Hawk remained stoical. The Swainson’s Hawk glowered. Now another family, another threesome of cactus wrens, joined us. Now everybody was giving the female Cooper’s Hawk a hard time.

Each cactus wren has its own voice. They have similar sounds but they manage to convey their own individuality. Personality comes through. They learn how to give voice, then how to make it their own. I’ve been standing in the middle of the road and had 4 cactus wrens surround me in the 4 directions, and each had its own voice. Even my lousy, old man ears could tell. What are they saying? Then I realize I don’t even know what they do all day. I don’t even know where they go. Territoriality seems to fade with the seasons. There are whole periods when they just disappear for weeks at a time. Where are they? What are they doing? On vacay? Down at the river? Visiting the relatives?

They must be constantly checking things out. I mean, checking everything. Everything must be scrutinized. It’s the only way to tell. Edible? Attractive? Dismissed. Move on. They have their preferred area, they have an extended area. They have spaces I can only imagine: for birds, besides trees’ leafy crowns, the outside of the tree, trees also have an inside, the interior near the trunk, the heart and hub of the tree. That is a space hard for me to navigate. And what they do all day is they probe, investigate. Up high, on the ground. Constant alert exploration, which is an interaction. One can always tell when a cactus wren has investigated a flower pot. Or gone through a sidewalk seam. Touching everything with a beak tap. No fingers, beak. Just as our fingers yearn for new textures, that beak is drawn to hidey holes – cracks, crevices, burrows. Something is everywhere.

When I returned from a week vacay, I pulled in to our driveway at dusk. The driveway is alongside a good-sized mesquite tree. Getting out of the car, I unpackaged myself stiffly, and the mesquite erupted with chups and taps and did-did-dids. For sure, the cactus wrens, welcoming me home.

I had a dream I entered a cactus wren’s dream. The leaves were so big! The cactus wren was upset, puzzled, over his decoys. He was trying to recall the decoy pattern. Abruptly, he stopped, turned, looked me in the dream eye, and signaled, what the heck are you doing here?