Yvette's Inner Geek Blog

While sitting in my living room with my laptop and coffee this morning, I heard a bird squawk in the vicinity of my chimney. OH NO, I thought. Not again.

It’s been raining, just like it was two years ago when a bird fell into our chimney pipe.

I walked closer to the chimney pipe, but the bird’s steady squawks lasted less than a minute and there was no horrific, frantic scritching sound to indicate that it had fallen down the pipe. I stood there for a minute, then returned to my laptop.

Dear Google,

northern flicker call

The top two sites were the ones I expected to see: whatbird.com (makers of the bitchin’ app that is the main reason I want an iPhone) and the All About Birds, the most totally awesome online bird guide from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology that I’ve used quite a bit. It only took one sound bite to confirm that the visiting bird was indeed another Northen Flicker. Or maybe the same one, just dropping by to say hello? It was using the “kyeer” call that sounds really creepy when emanating unexpectedly from the chimney of my old, never used wood-burning (or is is coal-burning?) stove fireplace.

In any case, it’s been an hour and there have not been any other sounds. So the bird was probably just sitting at the top of the pipe, hopefully not using it as a port-o-potty or anything, before it flew off.

We should really get a cap on the top of that chimney…

*I should note that just about every time I’ve attempted to type “Flicker,” I initially spelled it “Flickr” like the photo-sharing site. Stupid companies being cool and jacking up my typing integrity.