I caught a Robin Redbreast red-handed: she was taking soil from a tray on the porch. She took my seedlings, too, but only to toss them aside. She was treating my lovingly planted seedtray as her personal mudpile. Robins need wet soil to make their nests. 

Most yards nearby are solid turgrass with no soil in sight, but even my yard’s bare patches aren’t useful to her: they are compressed with our walking, and cracked with no rain. 

So I sat on the porch and watched the tray.
She came, she stole, she flew across the street. 

Then I hid the tray under my chair. A moment later, the Robin was under my chair, too.

Continue reading “What a Robin Sees (Spring edition)” →