Thrasher Family

Curve-billed Thrashers work hard, as they would no doubt tell you themselves if they could speak; every fallen leaf, every rock pile, everything potentially edible or potentially hiding something edible is a task, a challenge to be overcome, and they go about their business with an earnestness and an energy that makes me glad to outweigh them.

Never are they busier than right now, though, with the first fledglings joining their parents in the search for food and adventure. Our quail block sustained such a family all morning today, the fluffy juveniles giving an incessant squeaky chatter, the parents whacking off great chunks of seed with those wicked bills and stuffing them into the fledglings’ throats in equal efforts, I think, to sate them and to shut them up. The other birds stay carefully out of their way, probably a good choice!