We put a man on the moon, can't we do something about the foodchain?

Before I go any further let me just remind you that I was born and raised in the city. A big city on the west coast. I was probably seven or eight years old before I learned that milk came from a cow instead of a carton and after I found that piece of information out I gave up drinking milk forever, thereafter.

I tell you this so you will understand that my experience with nature and animals came to me later in life after I married the all American country boy and small game hunter. And yes, I had Biology in high school and we studied the food chain but for gosh sake reading about it in a textbook and seeing it in person is a little different.

A few weeks ago a mama redbird decided to build her nest in the grapevine wreath by our front door. Of course, being a mother myself, we immediately bonded. I watched her work endlessly as she put her nest together with just the right materials and thought to myself what a clever decorator she was when she finished the nest off with a couple of dark feathers sticking up in the back. I named her Maddy after our granddaughter and she quickly became part of our family.

While we sat on our deck in the evenings she sat above us on her nest as if this had always been her home. One afternoon my friend Nancy and I were visiting in the yard and when we stepped up on the deck we found a baby bird (deceased) lying on the deck. I just freaked out screaming for my husband, "Oh my gawd! Come quick something terrible has happened!" The spouse of course thinks something terrible HAS happened and when he finds my hysteria is only over the body of a not completely formed baby bird, he is not too happy with me. Nancy is saddened by this event but being a savvy country girl herself (she taught me that you say you are bleeding like a stuck pig and not a stuffed pig) just tried to calm me down. After I had said "This just makes me sick!" for the 20th time both Nancy and the spouse left me standing there.

Later my husband tries to explain to me that there may have been something wrong with the baby and the mama instinctively did away with it. "It's nature's way," he says. I want desperately to climb on a stool and look in the nest when Maddy is gone to check on the status of her other eggs or children but the spouse says I have to leave it alone, so I do. I think that whatever is in there will be safe. After all, what could possibly harm mother and nest so close to our door?

Late yesterday evening we had a rain storm to end all rain storms. Wind, hail, but mostly just blowing rain like I have never seen before. Maddy is on her nest and I am so thankful she is out of the elements. After the storm I am sitting in a living room chair looking out the storm door when I see Maddy flying back and forth frantically and in a split second something dropped on the deck with a loud KERPLUNK. It all happened so fast. I ran to the door to find the fattest black snake I'd seen in years curled up and Maddy still flapping her wings. Now, I tell you the truth when I say I am not afraid of snakes. I don't do spiders or mice, but long ago when I was younger and quicker my husband taught me how to kill a snake by picking it up by the tail and popping its head on the ground. One of a few things I think he is proud that he taught me. But last night I KNEW the minute I saw that snake what he had done and I couldn't bare to go near him.

I put the old "Oh my gawd, come quick!" into gear and the spouse came and killed the snake. Maddy flew away. I ranted, I cried, I paced back and forth on the deck and chanted "It's not fair! It's not fair!" I was physically ill. My husband sent me inside to calm down. I actually prayed that Maddy would come back, but it began to get dark and I knew she was gone. They were all gone. My husband reminds me again that its nature's way and the way the food chain works.

Well, I don't like it. If we can put a man on the moon surely to goodness we can train snakes to do something besides rob nests of baby birds. The spouse says Maddy will build again somewhere else and probably soon and try to raise another batch of babies. I can only hope she finds somewhere safer than next to my front door.