PEA RIDGE — We have a family of barn swallows who seem to enjoy being at school at the School Heritage Building on the downtown campus in Pea Ridge. The swallows already had their nest built high under the front entryway when members of the Pea Ridge Historical Society began renovating the building several months ago. Everybody agreed that we shouldn’t tear down the nest, and that we would allow the tiny new school birds to mature in their snug little home. A few weeks ago I thought I had made a mistake when I was painting under the entryway near their nest. I came a bit too close for comfort, the little birds all jumped out of their nest. Their flying was pretty wobbly, and I was afraid I had scared them out too soon, and that they might not make it back to their little home. I guessI needn’t have worried, they all made it back into the nest, and all have survived and are thriving well.
I also have discovered another barn swallow family in our old barn on the farm. I noticed that we always seem to have birds flying around inside, and several times I have ducked when one of them came darting close by me. I soon found their nest tucked up under the joists that support the hayloft floor.
One thing a little annoying about the swallows is that they don’t clean up theirmesses. I guess cleaning up their messes now and then is part of the admission price we pay for watching them and enjoying them.
My wife is very much a bird lover, and she feeds the birds regularly out front and in back of our house. We never know what kind of birds will show up as the seasons change. We nearly always feed them the black sunflower seed. Most of our birds don’t seem to eat the mixed birdseeds very well. Interestingly, Nancy is also a cat lover. Those two affections don’t always go together. When we lived in Atkins, Ark., in the 1970s, our south neighbor was a bird lover. At the time we had a yellow cat that we called Kat. One day we heard a great commotion in our neighbor’s lawn, with lots of hissing and shooing, and suddenly ourKat came booming through a hole in the fence back into our lawn. It seems that our neighbor thought that Kat had come over to feast on her songbirds. Of course we thought he was just a friendly, lazy old cat who would never do such a thing. But, obviously, birds have a strange effect on cats, and even lazy catsmay get stirred up once in awhile.
When I was a boy growing up on the farm, we used to have lots of meadowlarks. I was always impressed by them, and enjoyed watching them and listening to them. I notice now that I’m not seeing the meadowlarks, and I’m wondering if they fell on hard times. Of course I’m sure that this dry, hot summer we are having is hard times for the birds and lots of other critters.
I’m hearing that the deer are coming up to people’s houses, apparently looking for water and something green and lush to eat. We also used to see quite a few road runners, as I call them, and I’m not seeing the roadrunners these days either. Maybe they just like dirt roads, and don’t take to the new paved road that passes our farm. I usedto be a big fan of Wile E.
Coyote and the Roadrunner at the movies. At first, I was all for the Roadrunner, and I thought it was such great fun when he out-witted the coyote, and tricked old Wile E. into jumping out into thin air and falling hundreds of feet onto the jagged rocks below. But I remember at one point that I got to thinking that old Wile E. seemed never to give up trying, despite his bruises and humiliations, and sometimes I found myself rooting for him. Not that I wanted him to actually catch and devour the Roadrunner, but he should at least be able to catch him and almost devour him once in a while. Life is not always fair, as one sees in the luck of Wile E. Coyote.
I remember how my father-in-law, Ray Patterson, used to despise the old starlings, and to try different things to drive them away. At our house, the main nuisance birds were the sparrows. They liked to roost in the barn rafters above the hay mow. Like the swallows, the sparrows didn’t have proper bathroom manners either.
Back in the days when we had corn fields and sweet corn in the garden, we used to have to contend with the crows. The crows and their cawing are interesting, in a way, but I remember how stirred up my dad got when a bunch of crows came visiting the corn field. I’ve seen him grab the shotgun, and let off a blast or two near them. That would send them off squawking and cawing for a little while, but the scare didn’t last long, and it all may have been a waste of ammunition.
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Editor’s note: Jerry Nichols, a native of Pea Ridge, is a retired Methodist minister with a passion for history.
He is vice president of the Pea Ridge Historical Society. He can be contacted by e-mail at [email protected], or call 621-1621.
Community, Pages 5 on 07/04/2012