By Mike Lubow
An award-winning artistic director, now retired, Mike Lubow has channeled his love of birding, nature, the Colorado mountains, and writing into his first novel, The Concept Folks. A nature-inspired journey romp, the e-book is garnering reward for this expert and witty storyteller. Lubow additionally contributes to the birdwatching neighborhood as a employees author for the favored weblog, Two-Fisted Birdwatcher, the place he shares his insights and experiences in ornithology.
We’re in Southeastern Florida. It’s not a trip. C’mon, the season’s late summer time. In different phrases, sizzling, humid, actually sizzling, and more likely to have a hurricane. However this isn’t in regards to the climate. Our go to is a household gathering. However this isn’t about that both. That is—what would you anticipate, contemplating the place you’re studying this—a couple of hen.
A Southeastern hen. A hen of the semi-tropics we name Florida, and the flat-out tropics we name anyplace close to there the place a hen can fly. And we see a hen. Okay, for the second, all else is out the window, off the desk, not value losing phrases over. What we need to give attention to is that this hen seen in sizzling humid Florida.
However earlier than we get to the I.D. right here’s a enjoyable reality: the hen just isn’t on the wing, not in a tree, not in water, not in a palmetto or shrub, not on the bottom, no, the hen is becoming a member of us for breakfast. It’s in a restaurant. An indoor restaurant. Sitting on a chair at a close-by desk.
People are having breakfast. (Eggs make an ironic look, however they’re ignored by this hen). The factor you’d most likely need to know, contemplating you’re somebody who reads this hen stuff, is: what form of Southeastern hen was it?
Possibly you’re hoping it was a Painted Bunting. The jackpot of Southeastern hen sightings, however you suppose: get actual. That wildly coloured hen is simply going to be noticed within the wild. So what was it?
Might or not it’s a Hudsonian Godwit? They do present up alongside the Atlantic coast throughout fall migration. However not the case. We identical to saying that identify. Hudsonian Godwit. (And it’s truly on our life checklist).
Might or not it’s Miami’s personal nationwide hen, the state hen of Florida…the Mockingbird? Sitting in a restaurant mocking us. However no.
How about an American Coot. Nicely, the restaurant did have some coots, however of the human selection. Yeah, and it wasn’t a gull, or a Booby—Blue-footed or another form, although South Seaside is close to.
It wasn’t a Merlin, a Pied-billed Grebe, or Peewee. Not a Boat-tailed Grackle, Scrub Jay, Swallow, or Oriole, nor any one of many myriad warblers that flock up our discipline guides and life lists. No. So what was this fascinating restaurant-going wild Southeastern hen?
Reply. Frequent Home Sparrow. The type we see up north, and in every single place else. 12 months ‘spherical. A hen that’s nothing to write down residence about. One of the vital frequent birds in America, and possibly the entire world. That little brown and grey home sparrow. So what’s the large deal?
It was sitting on a chair.
In a restaurant.
And it was a hen.
In case you get pleasure from this visitor put up, Mike Lubow has written a novel titled “The Concept Folks) which is obtainable on Amazon.
Picture by Chris Peeters, taken from Pexels, a supply of free inventory pictures