“By definition an observer must observe, but not get involved. So when I saw the white squirrel atop a drift of new fallen snow, I knew that I was supposed to ignore the hawk that was flying above it in ever decreasing circles. With only 95 years on the job, I had little rank or privilege to do otherwise.
You could argue that saving a tiny rodent-like creature hardly qualifies as interference and I would agree, but does not mean the Boss would.
True, I did save that scarlet cardinal without consequences - the one in the cage in my room. It had fallen from the nest and had broken a wing. For weeks the baby’s valiant parents stood guard and brought it food in anticipation of the time when it would be developed enough to fly back to the nest it had shared with three siblings.
While one parent tended to the trio above, the other was constantly at the side of the injured one. Tenderly, the offspring was fed sustenance transferred from Mommy or Daddy’s loving beak, depending who was on duty.
Danger arrived one morning in the form of a five pound osprey, which had ventured from its usual lakeside feeding grounds. With its grappling claws extended, it was swooping towards the fledgling cardinal. The voracious predator was poised to carry off the little bird with its four sharp hooks on each murderous claw - two in the front and two in the back.
The mother bird in the nest saw it first.
“Chep, Chep, wheet, wheet, deet-adeet-adeet-ADEET-WHEET-WHEET”, she screamed in alarm and zoomed down to the side of her mate.
They stretched their wings out as far as possible and puffed up their feathers to make themselves appear larger. Together their wing span of two feet matched that of the predator, but their combined four ounces of weight didn’t even qualify them for a bantam weight fight, let alone a death-match against a massive 80 ounce monster!
And yet when the male redbird thrust out his chest, and the onyx mask on his face was highlighted by a sharp beak twisted into a grimace: the keen eyed osprey took notice and slightly checked the speed of its dive.
A second twinge of doubt quickly followed, when he noticed that the gray mask of the female cardinal also had the same corkscrew shaped beak.
The mated pair of cardinals bravely flew towards the rapidly descending predator. The eagle-like bully soared close enough to nearly lose an eye to the slashing blades of the crimson tandem; before deciding to go back to his regular diet of helpless fish that do not fight back .
I watched all this as a good observer should; never stepping in even when it looked as though all three birds plus the babies in the nest would end up as the osprey’s morning meal.
A Mated Pair of Cardinals