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Birdwatching
with Phyllis Yochem
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Tuesday, August 8, 2000
Whether house or tree, home is where the heart is
Migrating is for the birds; but many, like some humans, call only one place home
For me, one of the pleasures of birding is the ornithological vocabulary. A word with which I have always identified is a German word, ortstrue, which translates into English as "place faithfulness."
Some birds migrate, almost from one end of the world to the other. Some only move up or down the mountain. Others stay in one place all their lives.
Place faithfulness means returning to the same location year after year. It means enjoying a familiarity with a place that exerts an irresistible attraction.
My family and I had lived in one house for 45 years, until last January when we moved out to allow for plumbing and foundation repairs. This week, we are back. Ortstrue had exerted a strong pull on me, and though I had a pleasant place to stay while I was away from home, I was like the girl in the song who said, "Though there were two or three I used to date with, yet they always knew, I used them to wait with."
Home, sweet home
Boxes are piled to the ceilings now in this dear old house. I haven't dared fire up the new gas range, but it is sweet to awaken at dawn and see the trees I planted outside the window, to hear the mourning doves, descendents of others who sang to me, crying still to each other. It is good to walk outside the front door, turn on the hose and pull it across the yard. I kept the hummingbird feeders up, so my bright little jewels are still stopping by for a sip, and are joined by a number of early arrivals from this strangely premature fall.
The virtuoso family of mockingbirds has had a good summer with nary a tone-deaf child. They say they enjoyed the grapes in the back yard, and they did not leave a one. Goldenfronted woodpeckers have done well, too. A fearless, fuzzy young 'un roosts too long on the bare-arched limb of the live oak that I bought from Mr. Krejci, longtime nurseryman here, when he was old and I was young.
No restlessness here
Other plants that came from Mr. K. are Texas mountain laurels that reliably fill the back yard with their grape-soda fragrance in late February on the anniversary of the birthday of Kay McCracken, friend and birder and pioneer birding columnist at the Caller-Times.
The Carolina wren that has become resident in this neighborhood never fails to surprise and, for a moment, mystify me with its several uninhibited songs. Northern cardinals immediately caught on that the Yochems had returned and, as was their obligation, would be providing sunflower seeds in return for song.
Another ornithological word that captivates me, zugunruhe, means "migration restlessness." In birds, this seasonal urge keeps the species alive as it propels its members to journey long distances for the optimum opportunity to reproduce, survive and thrive. In human beings it simply translates into wanderlust, a desire to travel to strange lands and participate in different lifestyles. With me, safely returned to my place, it is only a faint, longing voice in my ear.
Phyllis Yochem, a Corpus Christi
resident, has studied birds of Texas since 1960.
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