Epilogue: Birds are Every Place

I read someplace that a birder is deeply conscious of birds everywhere. And that lesson came to mind two days ago when I took a short side trip to a non-birder destination in New Bern, NC: Tryon Palace. For despite my stated interest in the magnificent gardens, birds continued to occupy my attention. There was the Northern Cardinal on the kitchen garden wall; the Fish Crow perched on the northeast corner of the great house; the Robins on the lawn; the Northern Mockingbird in the Latham Memorial garden; and above all, the Rock Doves (i.e. Pigeons) who actually use the reconstructed dove cote on the west side of the palace grounds. It was pure instinct that made me look up and see these three characters at the doorway to their rookery. Once we take that step into active observation of birds, no matter how humble, we begin a new consciousness of where birds are and what they are doing, even when we are supposedly doing something else. Now, I wonder whether Governor Tryon paid any attention to his backyard birds in those long passed 1770s?