The Uncertainty of Bird Watching
Birds, as I’ve learned time and again, don’t care about my schedule.
I’ve planned trips, obsessively checked eBird lists, bumped a rental car down paths that are roads in name only, waded through mud, and been over my head in prairie grass—and the birds just aren’t there.
I’ve stopped randomly at a park just downstream from a dam and seen a flock of wild turkeys fly across the river. I’ve caught sight of a Cape May Warbler in my backyard. And, on one memorable drive to pre-K drop-off, a Barred Owl swooped no more than six feet above the hood of my car.
Birdwatching, then, is knowing the right season, going to the right places, and understanding that there is so much in this world that is out of our control. It’s also being at peace with that. It’s finding a moment of joy in an unexpected breeze, in the play of light and shadow on a trail, in knowing that the unexpected is always just a moment away—even if that moment isn’t now.
A lesson I’m learning (it’s a process, y’all) is to slow my expectations down, to place them in a longer and broader view. Each time I walk down a trail there is a whole world of possibilities waiting for me. I am unlikely to encounter them all at once, hell, I’m lucky if I get one or two. But the possibilities remain for the next trip or the next random run-in.
Harris Neck National Wildlife Refuge is tucked right next to where the marshland of McIntosh County begins in earnest. A former airfield, it’s a piece of land with elevation measured in inches as more than feet.
Several human-made ponds dot the refuge, a welcome spot for birds, bugs, and the occasional alligator. I’m trying to get a better look at a pair of Glossy Ibis and find myself walking along what I hope is a path, a small ridge, really, with the pond on my left and tall, thick grass that drops to a small runoff stream on my right. The trees at the pond's edge limit my view of the Ibis, but they also provide a welcome home for the thousands of sand gnats who love my company. I am fearful that I’ve made A Wrong Choice by following this trail.
It was then that a sharp movement in a tangle of tall grass caught the corner of my eye. A small bird, a sparrow or wren, but beyond that, it remains out of view. For a few minutes, I see the grass shiver here, then there, and then further along. It’s like a cartoon, following the bird's movement through the shivering of the grass.
Then, the bird pops into sight, a beaut of a Sledge Wren balancing itself on two stalks. For the next few minutes, it just hangs out for a bit, head on a swivel, shifting its balance as the grass moves ever so slightly. Just one of many possibilities, an unexpected moment of joy.
