ONA WING & A PRAYER
STONE THE FLAMIN’ CROWS! SWOOPING SEASON HAS ARRIVED EARLY AND INFORMER HAS FOUND HIMSELF SOMEWHAT OF A CHICK MAGNET
Though it’s still a few weeks until spring, Informer can confirm the premature arrival of the worst aspect of this otherwise lovely season. I am even sporting evidence via a couple of flesh wounds to my otherwise lovely face.
When I was small, my mother would recite a charming snippet of doggerel that goes: “Spring is sprung, the grass is riz, I wonder where the birdies is”.
Well, Mum need wonder no longer because the ‘birdies is’ dug in along my favourite running routes and swooping Informer to their evil hearts’ content.
One couldn’t fail to notice the ominous signs among the magpies, crows and plovers in Informer’s neighbourhood during June and July. It’s the same every year, warning all runners that we have only a few precious weeks before the birds transform from feathered friends into feathered frenzy.
Beaks are sharpened, beady eyes are focused and attack strategies are hatched, so to speak, as chick protection is taken to fanatical extremes.
As the birds become psychopaths, running paths become warpaths. I can imagine them relaxing in their nests after a hard day’s dive bombing, all cackling and cawing with laughter as they recall victims going from gorgeous gaits and classy cadences to ducking, dashing, darting dances of fear. Stooped, panicked and arms waving, runners zigzag from bush to tree to any semblance of cover to avoid their deranged avian assailants.
While Informer has endured this ignominy many times — I’m a chick magnet, people — the fact is I cannot help seeing this year’s experience as a case of ornithological betrayal, particularly given my recent efforts to become entrenched on the good side of the local bird population.
It seemed to be working too. For as reports came in of early season swoops causing terror and injury, Informer initially remained ignored by the winged squadrons, continuing to run untroubled as fellow plodders shrieked, swore or simply surrendered, bought treadmills and stayed in.
How clever I was, I thought, to have taken such pains to say hello to every magpie, crow and loathsome plover during my winter workouts. How clever I was to carry yummy treats to distribute among them. How clever I was to ensure the birdbaths at home were always full.
Foolishly, I believed I was building relationships that were sure to pay off via being left alone during swooping season. Selfish perhaps, but at this time of year it’s every runner for him or herself.
Informer’s hubris was short-lived, thanks to one rebellious total bastard of a crow that is now the owner of my 2015 Sydney Swans membership cap and two chunks of my face.
Worse, rather than earn a fierce rebuke from his mates, his example has instead inspired them to target your beloved correspondent with terrifying zeal.
They lay in wait on my old routes. They lay in wait on my new ones. Magpies also possess facial recognition skills and I suspect the ones near my place not only recognise me, but have distributed identikit pictures to every other bird in the neighbourhood.
What this means is that for the time being I’ll be packing it as every bird seeks some cheep thrills by picking me for a pecking. Talk about meet the flockers. If I make it, I’ll see you next beak.
“AS THE BIRDS BECOME PSYCHOPATHS, RUNNING PATHS BECOME WARPATHS.”