Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Wren on the Porch

I completely forgot to mention the wren I discovered trapped in our porch on the morning I was getting ready to drive back to school. I was making trips back and forth to my car, loading it up with my stuff, when something darted from one corner of the porch to the other. I froze, watched the corner where the bird had gone (it was hidden from view) until it flew up and landed on one of the rafters (is that the word I want?). The only variety of wren I've ever seen before was a Marsh Wren, but the gestalt impression of a wren is pretty distinct, and I knew I was looking at a member of the Troglodytidae family.

Okay, no, I didn't know the Latin name for the Wren family at the time, I looked it up just now.....but I intend to remember it from now on!

I ran for my new camera (already in the car buried under a bunch of my stuff) and back to the porch. I managed to get a few good pictures before making an effort to guide the wren out of my porch. Our screen door is currently off the hinges, so there's an exit and entrance that remains unblocked, but once the bird accidentally gets in there, it's hard to find that gap in the screening again.
So after selfishly getting a few pictures, I turned my attention to trying to guide the wren back outside. I grabbed some birdseed and scattered it in a little path towards the door (well, towards the empty doorframe where the door would normally be). I waited a few minutes, tried some intermittent pishing, but I really had no idea how to help the little fellow out. I decided that leaving him alone was the best thing to do, since my presence was no doubt only adding to his anxiety and agitation. I went inside and told my parents and my brother that there was a wren on the porch, and that they should stay away from it until it found it's way out.

At that point, I had to get going. I was heading up to my boyfriend's house first, and then we were going to caravan back to school together. I am ALWAYS late, so the night before when I had told him I would try to be there around 11 am he responded with "So I'll expect you here around 1, right?". I was determined to be on time to spite him (hehe) so I left with the wren still stuck on our porch.

I texted my parents later on that day to ask if the wren had gotten out, but didn't get any response. And, I have to be honest, I've more or less forgotten about the incident since then, so I'm actually not sure what ended up happening. I'll find out.

Other than the Porch Wren I forgot to report, I've got a very exciting nothing else to say. Still haven't seen any visitors to the feeders. I'm hoping to go birding on Thursday, this lack of bird watching is making me grouchy.

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