Oh, It's War

Before I get too far into this post, I take pause to warn you: please don't judge me until you've finished reading. I may not be the best person, and this post certainly doesn't show my loving, gentle nature, but just hear me out. You may be on my side by the end, and if not, please forgive me.

It is spring here in Mesa, many of you know that already. We've got lovely blue skies, and mild temperatures. Perfect for tomato ripening. And, alas, spring also means birds. Lots, and lots of noisy birds. You see, there is a large (15 year old) willow in the backyard behind us, a large ficus next door and across the street, and several large cypress in the other backyard behind us, and birds LOVE these trees. Love them! So spring brings birds, mating birds-on my fence (we told the boys last year when asked that they were playing leap frog or dog pile), loud tomato eating birds, nest building birds. It doesn't help that we're 2 miles due east from a riparian preserve AND along the canal route.

Two weeks ago some birds ate four, yes 4, of my big, ripe beefsteak tomatoes (and I'm still waiting for the next crop to come on, stupid birds). So we had to net the entire garden-they also ate a pumpkin and cantelope seedling. Now it's a big pain to prune my tomatoes.

This past weekend, after watching dumb, mating birds all along our fence for two weeks, we found that we had nesting birds on a ledge at our entry. Oh, no you DON'T. I don't care if you are doves, you're still a cousin to pigeons, and you still poop all over my front porch and pillar. Now, this pair of doves must have been of the hardy stock, for they built (or were trying to build) their nest on a nail strip that a previous owner had installed up there. On Sunday we noticed them. After yelling at them, and tossing a pebble or two up there, Eric got out the hose to make our point known. I had to hose them down two more times Sunday, the second time I got their partial nest too. Now, had I been smarter, and it not Sunday, I would have gathered up the pile of dropped twigs and their "nest" and thrown them away, but I didn't.

On Monday, they were back, again. Out came the hose, it took some serious effort to dislodge them, and made my arm very wet in the process (we don't have a sprayer head, just my thumb). Less than an hour later they were back. Once again, out came the hose, but this time to no avail. So, I am only slightly ashamed to admit this, I had Aidan get me some bouncy balls (I didn't want to hurt them, or my house, by throwing rocks). I didn't hit them, but was close enough to scare them away with the first toss. I had to go back out there two more times, seriously why didn't they get the point (bird brained I guess). Well, after my fourth, or was it fifth time out there, I had more than lost my patience. On my third throw of this set, I tagged that stupid dove, and it finally flew away. I'm not proud of myself for hitting a dove (but I am pretty pleased that I actually hit my target-it was a rather difficult shot with a bouncy ball), but I'm so glad they haven't come back. Yet.

Although, all last night, and again today, I've had this nagging fear. I'm afraid that the birds will seek retribution, and I'll get stuck in a scene reminicent of Hitchcock's The Birds.

Note: In my defense, when we bought our house last year there were two piles of bird poop on our entry that were a good 10 inches deep, seriously.