Turns out... for the same reason the chicken did.

(....scene opens...)

The day: semi-cloudy with flirtations of sun.
The cast: avid amateur birders
Time of day: the time of day when birders should really be working but can't help themselves

Perhaps 8-9 avid birders are staring into "The Kirtland's Tree" watching the performance of the rare and beautiful, but frustratingly active, Kirtland's warbler.  Binoculars are focused on bits of leaves and tree flowers where the Kirtland's used to be fractions of a second earlier.  Camera lenses search the foliage....

Then... a shout!   What is that!   Look! ....in the road!   A rather hunched bird of sort of intermediate size is seen crossing.... ....no.... .....strolling... ......no, it was really more like moseying across the road!   Car's breaks screech, babies cry, birders hold their breath!  (OK... slight exaggeration)  Traffic comes to a standstill as the least bittern saunters across the road expecting all traffic to wait on its passage.  It strolls into some lucky person's yard across Kinnear Road and under some bushes.  Our hero stands agape thinking that maybe this is the least bittern that was seen earlier at OSU wetlands.  ....just out on walk-about.  Our hero examines his camera screen and there it is!  A picture of a least bittern crossing the yellow lines in the middle of the road.   It really happened!

(....scene closes as happy birder/photographer carries away with him a precious image that he is absolutely sure no one else ever has or ever will.   Well.... except for the other photogs that were there too.)

Realize that, here we were, birders, looking at a very rare bird we were lucky enough to have in our own backyard (OK, some people were there from Pittsburgh but we won't hold that against them since they were obviously birders).   This least bittern had to have strolled along underneath the very tree into which we were staring!  So,  what with the Kirtland's and now this very rare occurrence of a life bird (for me) strolling across a busy road just to (apparently) get to the other side, I thinking that we rename the tree from "The Kirtland's Tree" to the "Magic Birder's Tree".   I'm thinking that maybe instead of going to some metro park or woods, I'll just go to the "Magic Birder's Tree" and sit until the magic happens again!

Tim


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