For the Birds

Remember when we found the bird's nest in our Christmas wreath last May? Well we never did take the wreath down. Every time we thought we'd take care of that, we discovered that there was another family of birds flying in and out of the wreath. I figure that Christmas decoration housed four bird families over the length of the summer.

Finally we decided we might as well just leave it up for this Christmas. After Christmas, each time I thought about taking the wreath down we'd have more snow and an icy driveway, so we didn't want Bruce climbing the ladder right then.

Now it's spring, the wreath is still there, and we've seen birds checking it out.

A few weeks ago, in the nice weather, I decided it was time to start grilling again. Burgers, chicken, kebabs . . . Yum! But when I went to light the grill it was full of weeds and grass. Naughty kids! In fact, it looked like just the kind of thing Rachel or Jessica would do. I pulled out as many as I could, then lit the grill and burned up the rest.

A week later, when I went to use the grill again, it was full of weeds. Grrrrr! I guess I didn't say anything about it to the kids the first time. Again, I took most of them out and burned the rest. When it happened a third time I made sure to tell the kids not to pile weeds into the grill! They all denied doing it—and with such innocent faces too!

Yesterday I caught the culprit red-handed! Or should I say "red-billed?"

As I was sitting here at the computer I saw a starling land on the deck-railing right next to the barbecue. It was holding a red ribbon or paper in its beak. It looked around a little, and hopped along the rail behind the grill. After a minute, it hopped along the rail on other side of the grill without the red thing. Hmmmm. I started thinking about those weeds I'd been finding lately. After the bird flew away Bruce and I went to look and, sure enough, there were some weeds and the red thing sitting on the grill. But how did it get in? On further investigation we discovered that when the lid is closed, there's a two-inch gap on the hinge side. Aha! (Bruce says, "I thought there was bird-poop in there the other day, but I couldn't figure out how it got there!")

I've been watching this morning. Sure enough, this little bird and his friend have been coming and going from my barbecue grill all day long. They are very sneaky, looking around carefully and frequently stopping in the branches of the nearby maple tree—no doubt to throw those horrible, nest-burning humans off the trail.

I'm sure to the starlings this must seem like a marvelous nesting place—safe from the weather, dogs, cats and people. They're not going to give it up just because their stuff keeps disappearing.

My question is, how do I keep birds from nesting in my barbecue?

p.s. 2 1/2 weeks left to enter the fabulous poetry contest!