On the porch stood a robin — just a robin and nothing more. I jumped back with a start. Not that I am afraid of a robin, of course, but having such a bird knocking at my cottage door was slightly eerie. The robin, seeing me, also gave a start, dropped a thread of dead grass from her beak, and flew off with a squawk.
I looked around, smiled, then shut the door. I returned to my laptop and began tapping away myself. With no repeat of the rapping on the door, I soon got back into the rhythm of my work. During a brief pause and deep in thought, I gazed out over the beautiful lake. Suddenly I was greeted by the horrifying spectacle of a dark shape hurtling itself against the large window. I jumped up and ran to look, expecting to see a poor, stunned bird lying dying on the cottage porch.
Instead, I saw my robin. She hopped up on the armrest of the hewn log rocking chair, peered briefly in at me, and then suddenly assaulted the windowpane once again. I stared wide-eyed. Again and again she repeated the manoeuvre, hurtling herself at the window, falling back on the wood porch, and hopping back on the chair, before doing it all again.
The robin was stark raving mad, I was convinced of that. She was half cuckoo bird.
I had a sudden, horrible vision of her breaking the glass window and then attacking me where I stood, pecking me to death. I opened the door and shooed her away. She flew to a nearby tree and from there screeched at me, as if I were the crazy one.
I returned to my table but could no longer focus on any work. Time and time again, the robin returned to the porch, repeating her ridiculous attacks on the window. I tried shutting the curtains, to no avail. I tried moving the chair away, but this only served to eliminate one stage of her attack. I found a roll of masking tape and stuck strips across the glass panes, but this only slowed her for a while.
I looked around for ideas. I contemplated taping a photo of my wife to the window, but knew instinctively that even if this worked I would lose. I took the book jacket off a Rick Mercer Report book I was reading and taped the photo of Rick onto the glass. All was quiet. I looked out: the robin had retreated into the trees.
I felt quite alone the rest of the day and evening, and suffered through a restless night. I was up early the next morning, and when I opened the door a crack to look out I scared the robin away from her window perch. She had built a neat nest on the ledge, under the cover photo of Rick Mercer, his forehead only slightly whitewashed.
I had come up to the cottage by myself this time to do some cottage chores and to get some peaceful work time in, before the kids were out of school for summer holidays. I realize now why I have always insisted the cottage is meant to be a family place — it is a scary place to visit alone.
The Nesting Box
A neighbouring cottager gave me a nesting box a few years back. It was of simple wood construction, two feet high, one foot wide, and one foot deep, with an entry hole cut out in the upper front and a slanted roof that could be removed for cleaning. Following his instructions, I filled the box with clean straw in the autumn and nailed it onto a leaning birch tree, about ten feet from the ground and six feet back from the lakeshore. I’m not sure I expected anything.
The following spring, upon our return to the cottage and after all our opening chores were done, I spied the lonely box high in the tree and decided it was vacant. I wondered about hanging an “Apartment for Rent” sign. I climbed the rickety cottage ladder to see if anything, any animal or bird, had taken the time to check out the premises. I peered in the round entry door and was immediately taken aback by two glowing eyes and a terrifying hiss from within, a demonic sound that had me falling backwards from my stoop into the shallow lake waters.
For three springs running, the box was occupied. Each fall I would clean it and fill it with fresh straw, and each spring the female would be nesting. It is wonderful having a family of mergansers darting this way and that in our quiet bay, hiding out under the boathouse or in the grass and shrubs along the shoreline, a string of little chicks trailing after an attentive mother. This summer, our mergansers are absent.
My dog smelled the problem first. I saw her sitting at the foot of the birch, staring up at the wooden box, tilting her head this way and that and sniffing the air. At first I thought there must be a mother with chicks, and ordered the dog away. Then I smelled the sulfury stench of bad eggs. I carefully climbed the ladder and peered in. Sadly, I found nine eggs in the nest, abandoned and rotting. Either the mother had simply left her eggs or, more likely, she had met an unfortunate end: a fox, wolf, angry loon, or crazed boater. As landlord and owner of the nesting box, I felt partially responsible for the loss.
Build it, and they will come.
We try to help out Mother Nature in little ways. Feeders are hung from tree branches, their seed kept replenished for the songbirds that sing the praises of each new day. Hummingbird stations are kept filled with sweet nectar and hung off the porch. Bat houses are built to attract the night flyers, who in turn keep the mosquito population in check. Nesting boxes are strategically placed on trees along the rocky shoreline. All are kept clean, fresh, sanitized, and in good repair.
At my previous home, a ranch in British Columbia, I built several mountain bluebird nesting boxes and fixed them, according to instructions, five feet from the ground, south-facing, on fence posts. I was proud when a pretty female bluebird took up residence. She started bringing in little sprigs of grass in her delicate beak to make a nest.
I bragged to my wife about my new tenant. I gloated to her about my important position as nature’s aide. That is, until my wife beckoned me outside the following morning. I was horrified to see my wily old barn cat, Charlie, perched on the nesting box roof with a paw raised, ready to swat the unfortunate bird when she departed. I chased the cat away, evicted the little renter for her own good, and removed the box. Domestic cats tend to take full advantage of our generosity towards birds.
As cottagers, we tend to at least think we have a closer connection with nature, and we want to help out in any small way we can. We do things with all good intentions, to the best of our ability, and with all available information. Still, we can fail and discover that nature might have fared better without our intervention.
That is how I felt when I discovered the abandoned eggs. My wise, glass-half-full wife pointed out our successes, and the many young mergansers who began their lives in our little nesting box. Hopefully a talented young merganser mother will take up residence next spring, and when we see that young brood following their mother around the bay, we can be proud.
Time Moves On
I attended my oldest daughter’s Grade 8 graduation during the last week of school. It was one of those bittersweet moments. As she received her diploma, wobbling across the stage in high heels that proved themselves far more difficult than the usual runners or flip-flops, I beamed with a father’s pride. My little girl had grown up.
At the same time, I took in the ceremony with a somewhat heavy heart. Sure she had grown, but how fleeting those childhood days seem now. Was it not just yesterday that I carried her around on my shoulders and bounced her on my knee? She walked in my footsteps. I was her hero and she was my princess — well, no, she was never a princess. Now, she worries that I may embarrass her — and I undoubtedly have by even mentioning her in this space.
Life moves on and you can’t change that.
Time moves on and she has grown up, and for this special night at least, she has traded her jeans, T-shirt, and sneakers for an elegant dress. I looked at her, and it frightened me. She was beautiful. My daughter was no longer a child, she was a woman, and I was in trouble. I looked around me, and I am sure this is a sentiment most of the parents shared when seeing their daughters and sons maturing like this.
When I said that I would like to get her a graduation present, she suggested a cellphone, something that many of her friends have received. I considered it for a moment and then bought her a kayak. I think she was quite pleased with the surprise, and if she is anything like me, she does