The Feeder in Winter
Flash fiction, 700 words. A departure from my usual work, but for a good cause! Migrations are starting. Stock up on birdseed, and beware ye the bears!
The birds met, as they always did, in the heart of the rhododendron.
“The bear,” said Blue Jay solemnly, setting the agenda.
Noises of perturbation – squawks and whistles and a piercing chirp – erupted in this last green refuge beneath the snow.
“He’s ruined everything!”
Goldfinch had only stayed because seeds were plentiful here. To think – to think – that something so large should destroy the happiness of so many tiny lives. Despair settled like a cold wind in his hollow bones.
Cardinal nestled close to Dove. It must be nice to be so plump. Chickadee and Titmouse, normally rivals, chittered together in indignation.
“We are agreed, then, that we should harry him?” Crow spoke low, eagerly, practiced.
The others looked at him with dark, wary eyes.
“I would not say that,” countered the eldest Junco.
“Only because you eat what’s on the ground anyway,” scoffed Nuthatch. “Some of us have standards.”
“They won’t put out more, hanging or on the ground, if the bear is around.” said Blue Jay. He hadn’t gathered the conclave over some trifling matter. This was life or death. “We must persuade the bear to sleep, or drive him from here.”
The whole group could see the problem. It lay in the snow. A dark pole, twisted and bent, felled like a rotten tree. A crimson bucket, oddly shaped, its contents scattered and ruined in the white drifts. The birds had heard the humans talking. They would not build a new one. They could not. They feared the bear. The crimson bucket would no longer hang. The humans would no longer pour the seeds into it. They’d once threatened to renege on their tribute because of the squirrels. But it was the bear that had ruined everything.
A cacophony of schemes erupted. The Downy Woodpecker drummed on his branch, rattling the others into silence.
“Let those of us who carry weight in the woods speak to the bear,” he suggested. “I will tell my big brother with the red head and the black wings. He will certainly make himself heard. As for those of us who are small …” he began a low warble of conspiracy.
Sly glances sidled from dark eyes.
**
“You’ve got the whole forest. What does it matter?”
The bear was sleepy, grumpy, and defensive.
“Look outside. Look at your den. It is warm and dry here, but see how it sours without!” Crow alone thought himself equal to the bear, and so he was the chief emissary. “Are you going out today?”
“Of course not,” growled the bear. “It’s horrid out there.”
“The smallest among us do not have that luxury,” said Pileated Woodpecker, seizing, as he often did, the high ground. “Even in storms they must venture out, or they will starve. The offering in red saved them more than once. But what was it to you? A snack? A toy?”
From somewhere in the woods, piteous chirps of hunger and despair rose like a chorus before falling silent.
The bear was silent for a moment. Then, “I too, get hungry. But I did not know it was of so much importance to the small ones. I shall not approach it again.”
That was all well and good, thought Blue Jay, as he flew off. But there presently was nothing to approach. He hoped the others were playing their part.
**
Junco hopped fruitlessly. Dove puttered unceasing. Titmouse, Nuthatch, and Chickadee fluttered from above, only to abort their landings with sad and confused chirps. The humans watched from the window.
On the first day, a scattering of seeds appeared. On the second day, a new pole.
And on the third day, as the skies loomed white-dark and the winds bellowed from the north, a new bucket was hung. Azure as the summer sky, with garish patterns that made a mockery of bluebirds, it held the tribute due to the conclave: millet and sunflower and rye, cracked corn and peanuts. The golden fields of summer couldn’t produce such bounty as now burgeoned before the flocking multitudes.
There was rejoicing in the rhododendron. The assembly took turns dashing out into the snow to winnow prizes. A spirit of courtesy developed between even Chickadee and Titmouse.
It lasted a whole week, until squirrel bandits figured out how to open the feeder.