RE: Another strange birding anomaly

["Eric Huish" <poorwill_ at hotmail dot com>]

Last spring I had kestrels setting up house in my screech-owl box (my owls 
moved to a box down the street).  I witnessed my kestrels caching food 
often.  They most often cached mice in my neighbors rain gutters at the 
corner of the house past the down spout where there wouldn?t be much water.  
Once I watched the female eat half a mouse then place the rest in the 
gutter. I often saw the male place whole mice there.  The female would sit 
in the box and the male would bring food and call to her to come out and 
eat.  When the male came empty handed he would fish some food out of the 
gutter.

The rain gutter wasn?t the only spot they cached food..  I saw the male fly 
down onto the lawn, walk over to a tuft of grass and pull a mouse out.  It 
was obvious he wasn?t hunting. Unless this was a stupid and very slow mouse. 
 He would also stash rodents in a small Blue Spruce in the back yard.  The 
spruce was short enough I could walk up and see the stash.  The spruce tree 
may be the most similar to the wreath.

On another note, a couple years ago a group of us birders were birding a 
city park when a Magpie took a duckling from a mother mallard with a large 
clutch.  I watched the magpie fly off with its prize and then it cached the 
duckling at the base of some brush.  After the magpie flew off the duckling 
walked out of the brush and started calling for its mom.

I think Magpies could also be candidates for the mysterious cache.


Eric Huish
Pleasant Grove UT
poorwill_@hotmail.com
801-360-8777




----Original Message Follows----
From: "John Morgan" <jmorgan480@comcast.net>
Reply-To: "John Morgan" <jmorgan480@comcast.net>
To: "birdtalk" <birdtalk@utahbirds.org>
Subject: Another strange birding anomaly
Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 22:14:37 -0700

This is weird! Someone help please!

Story:
Carma (wife) put the Christmas wreath on our front door just after
Thanksgiving. At some point in early December, she brought the wreath in
to add something to it. She laid it on the living room couch that
evening, made the adjustments, then picked it up and put it back on the
front door.

Next morning in the light of day, I noticed something lying on the couch
where the wreath had been. Approaching closer, I see it's a dead mouse
(not dried and shriveled...no rigormortis...fresh, but some mangling of
the head). Sorry for the description, but its condition seems important
to the crime scene investigation.

Naturally, I had to show her. "Honey, why is there a dead mouse on our
couch?" Shrieks and screams ensue. After the melee, we wondered who
would play such a trick on us. "Could/would a bird have done this?" I
wondered.

The wreath is still up. Carma was off work today. I got another phone
call: "You're not going to believe this but there's another mouse in our
wreath today!"

OK, fine. I give up. Who's the culprit? Is this bird activity? What bird
caches it's food (mice)? 22nd W 90th S area of West Jordan. No Jays,
other than their hawk-heckling cousins, the Magpies. No Shrikes. No
mouse eaters other than the occasional Kestrels and SS Hawks/Coopers.

Has anyone else seen anything like this? We have no known human
pranksters in the area, but no birds have ever been witnessed hanging
around our front door.

Confused...and interested.
John
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