One of the joys on Galveston Bay at the onset of fall and the coming of winter is the arrival of great numbers of migratory waterfowl.  They augment our already numerous resident birds, so that, to the careful observer, our days are alive with many species flying, floating and perching anywhere the eye may look.

Our dominant southerly winds abate, also, and with the occasional north wind our tides are lower.  This leaves more beach exposed next to my house, drawing wading birds in.  Just yesterday three sandpipers were feeding there.  (See video below.)

(If you are a fan of collective nouns, as I am, you know that none are more colorful and quirky than those given to birds.  A group of sandpipers is…a fling!)

This afternoon, attending a Veteran’s Day ceremony with neighbor Chris, we spotted what we thought was a raft of ducks, but when he zoomed in on them with his magnificent camera (Chris is a profoundly talented professional photographer) we saw that it was a raft of a dozen or so Hooded Mergansers – the first I have seen here.

And above them flew an osprey with a large fish in its talons.  Chris captured a sequence of brilliant photos of it as it flew over us.

A few times this past week I have spotted a pair of kingfishers on my pier; this is a rare blessing, since they usually prefer more protected water.

May I never take these blessings for granted.  May their memories never fade from me.

William Cullen Bryant wrote a worthy poem on the subject:

To a Waterfowl

Whither, ‘midst falling dew,

While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,

Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue

Thy solitary way?

  Vainly the fowler’s eye

Might mark thy distant flight, to do thee wrong,

As, darkly seen against the crimson sky,

Thy figure floats along.

Seek’st thou the plashy brink

Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,

Or where the rocking billows rise and sink

On the chaféd ocean side?

There is a Power, whose care

Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,—

The desert and illimitable air

Lone wandering, but not lost.

  All day thy wings have fanned,

At that far height, the cold thin atmosphere;

Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,

Though the dark night is near.

  And soon that toil shall end,

Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest,

And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend,

Soon, o’er thy sheltered nest.

Thou’rt gone, the abyss of heaven

Hath swallowed up thy form, yet, on my heart

Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given,

And shall not soon depart.

He, who, from zone to zone,

Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,

In the long way that I must trace alone,

Will lead my steps aright.

Our coots are home!  At dawn today I saw the first large raft of coots of the fall.  They are back for the winter, and I welcome them with a happy spirit.

Of the vast diversity of birds here, migratory or resident, none is more plain or humble.  Neighbors and I will spend weeks in fall anticipating the return of the grand white pelicans, but we never speak of coots.  But I like them very much; they are my kind of bird: common, unpretentious, simple.  The pelicans dazzle me, but I feel at home with coots.

That thought occurred to me several years ago when it was time to write my annual Christmas letter.  Our coots seemed a fitting subject for the season.  So I thought I would share that letter.  My feelings about our plain friends hasn’t changed.

Christmas, 2011

Dear Friends,

“What a crazy old heron.”  “He’s a mean old sandpiper.”  “You’re turning into a crusty old roseate spoonbill.”

None of those sentences really makes sense, do they?  (The last one is just silly – I just like to use the name ‘roseate spoonbill’ whenever I can.)  But call someone an “old coot” and there’s no mistaking what is meant:  mean-spirited, misanthropic, intemperate…even downright ornery.

No one knows the origins of the phrase.  Why choose coots to describe ornery people?  Perhaps because they could not be less flashy or attractive; no less inspiring bird exists.  The American Coot is one of the most common waterfowl in all of North American:  found in 50 states, sometimes in ‘rafts’ of 1500 birds; plain in appearance; awkward in flight and walk (“spalatterer” is one nickname for the coot, for their ungraceful attempts to rise into flight).  One observer bluntly describes them as “unloved and unlovely aquatic birds…a truly ugly and awkward bird, and virtually inedible to most people.”  (Though Cajuns, who call them ‘poule d’eau’ – water chickens – are known to include them in gumbo.) 

Perhaps the name itself suits a pejorative.  Clipped and crude in its monosyllabic, Anglo-Saxon earthiness, ‘coot’ does not ring with music or rhythm.  Other aquatic birds similar in size and habits bear names that would fit just fine in a poem by Keats or Wordsworth: Golden Plover, Avocet, Little Curlew, Red Phalarope.  The Romantic poets never wrote an “Ode to a Coot.” 

Nor are they musical themselves.  Ornithologist John Tveten, author of “Birds of Texas,” describes coot calls as “a variety of clucks, cackles, grunts, and other harsh notes, some rather eerie.”

Is there any wonder then, that, if we must use a bird to describe dotty or mean people, we would settle on the coot?  There seems to be little about the species to recommend it for any higher purpose.

But I really must object.  For all their Quaker plainness and cackling grunts, I love these little birds.  They are daily winter companions, bobbing along the shore with a constancy more true than any other bird.  Like old chairs, they fill space with familiar comfort, but don’t distract us from all the more important things we clutter our lives with.  They endear themselves to me by their simple faithful presence.

They are tolerant of humans, even open to friendship with us.  I’ve read many accounts of bonds formed between coots and people.  A woman in San Diego where, as here, coots migrate in winter, writes of a years-long friendship with coots:

“I keep Cheezit crackers in my pocket and give the coots a few crumbs. If you hand feed them every day so that they can clearly see your face, coots will form lifelong bonds with people. It is always gratifying to have old friends come running up to me in the fall when I haven’t seen them for six months.”

Others note that coots recognize individual human faces, and they readily ‘flock up’ with people for safety and companionship, as they will do with almost any species that will tolerate them.

 And lastly, though certainly not least of all, the plain old coot was among the first birds to return with us to our scarred shores after the hurricane that battered our town three years ago.  Through that first dark winter of recovery, they were with us every day, small feathered tidings of comfort and joy.

And still more than that:  they offer a chance to test our capacity for mercy.  For all our crassness and knavery, every kind human heart reserves one of its best rooms for all the ugly, bumbling, humble creatures that fill our world – those who will never glide untroubled through the world thanks to the random gifts of beauty, grace or song.  I don’t hold my breath when I see coots, but I always smile.

We love coots with a sincerity we can’t quite muster for their more lovely, blessed kin.  That we do so is rare evidence that some residual of God still breathes in the human spirit.  If coots could ponder such things, I believe they would be grateful that, rather than being admired, they are loved. 

So from this old coot to you, best wishes for a joyous Christmas.

Fulica americana, the American Coot