Tag: animals

I remember, years ago, I used to like woodpeckers, admiring their colorful beauty and stately appearance, being amazed at their peculiar characteristic of using their beak as a drilling tool to find food or make a shelter.

However, when I learned that woodpeckers had taken an interest in my neighbor’s house, I immediately checked mine. Unbeknownst to me, they had been hard at work on the shutters on the south side of my home—fortunately, it was only the shutters.

My bride, an amazing cyber-sleuth, quickly learned that:

• It was usually just one or two woodpeckers that attack one’s abode, not a flock of them.
• There were a variety of motivations: looking for food, establishing a nest, or trying to attract a mate.
• There was no one guaranteed solution, but a list of possible ones— that may hinge on their motivation for pecking.
• Anything that hurts or kills a woodpecker—or disturbs their nests — is illegal; they are protected. (Not that I would want to harm them, but recalling the tenacity and rapidity of their work, courtesy of the old Woody Woodpecker cartoons, I can envision things quickly escalating out of control.)

As a first step, I filled and painted the holes.

That solved the problem—for a few days. Though they never returned to the south side of my house, they moved their focus to the shutters on the north side, which have now been filled twice and repainted.

I made a daily walk around my home’s perimeter, scrutinizing it for the telltale signs of a woodpecker at work. I am was pleased to state that I had been woodpecker free for seven days.

Do you like this post? Want to read more? Check out Peter’s book, Bridging the Sacred-Secular Divide: Discovering the Spirituality of Every Day Life, available wherever books are sold.

Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices. Read more in his books, blog, and weekly email updates.

Although I live in a rural area, my immediate surroundings are not; I reside in a subdivision. Even so, wildlife abounds. During the non-snowy months, I can, at any given time, look out my office window and see at least one animal and usually more. I’ve spent the last five months verifying this to be true.

The most common sight is birds. Squirrels come in second; sometimes they’re in pairs: darting, jumping, chasing, climbing.

I also see rabbits; they are common, but not a daily sight (though I don’t spend my time gazing out my window either.) When I see a hare, it’s always alone, which is a bit sad to mention.

But today I saw two: hopping, playing tag, hangin’ out. Then a third one appeared. One hops to my left, the other scurries right, while the third goes in a circle. They were on the smaller side, perhaps siblings from this year’s batch.

Then to my delight, a fourth one-hopped into view. A bit larger and more deliberate in movement. I surmised this to be their mom. For quite a while I admired their comings and goings, their freedom and their life.

I’m glad I took the time to watch them frolic; it was good to slow down—and to marvel.

Do you like this post? Want to read more? Check out Peter’s book, Bridging the Sacred-Secular Divide: Discovering the Spirituality of Every Day Life, available wherever books are sold.

Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices. Read more in his books, blog, and weekly email updates.

A few years ago I read some of my past posts on this blog, not for any nostalgic reason, but to see if I could merge some of them into a book, codenamed Woodpecker Wars. Here’s what I found:

Though some posts are dated and others are not good, I generally like what I’m reading. Some posts are entertaining and others are insightful. Many are interesting—at least to me. Occasionally I’ll read a post I forgot about and be impressed.

However, when it comes to the details, I’m mostly dismayed. My past work contains errors and typos. The perfectionist in me wants to go back and fix them, but that would be too time-consuming. 

That impulse to edit my past work reminds me of the book Flowers for Algernon. It’s about a mentally challenged man who undergoes an experimental process that catapults him to the genius level. Along the way, he’s encouraged to keep a journal.

At first it’s hand-written and a mess but gets better over time. He learns to type and seeks permission to edit and type his past entries but is told to leave them as is—they are part of his history and shouldn’t be altered.

While I am neither mentally challenged or a genius, I’ll also leave my old posts as is—or maybe I’m just lazy. Regardless, the content that does end up in Woodpecker Wars—along with some new writing—will undergo careful editing and scrutiny. After all, I don’t want to make the same mistakes twice.

Do you like this post? Want to read more? Check out Peter’s book, Bridging the Sacred-Secular Divide: Discovering the Spirituality of Every Day Life, available wherever books are sold.

Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices. Read more in his books, blog, and weekly email updates.

Once when I was working in my yard, I noticed a baby bird in the grass. This is not uncommon in the spring. Apparently, the mother deems the hatching young enough to be on its own and gives it a nudge out of the nest.

Sometimes they take off and fly. Other times they fall to the ground. If the flightless bird doesn’t catch on quickly, it will either die of starvation or be eaten. Flying provides both food and freedom.

Hoping to “motivate” it to take off, I slowly approached it. It began nervously chirping and hopping—a sure sign that it didn’t yet know how to fly. With my continued approaching, it fluttered its wings, but remained earthbound.

Becoming more fearful, it hopped and fluttered at the same time, rising a few inches before settling back down.

On a third try, it went a bit higher and made some forward movement. With me drawing still closer, it repeated the effort and faltered forward, sometimes only inches off the ground, and then with a newly acquired confident flap of its wings, gained altitude and glided to a nearby tree.

Thankfully, this story had a happy ending. As a result of panic it gained the ability to fly.

This reminded me when I was a kid. A friend and I were playing in a small pit, and my dog jumped in to join the fun. When we grew tired of this diversion, we climbed out, but my dog was stuck. It was too high for him to jump and too steep to climb.

His repeated efforts to free himself ended in failure; no amount of coaxing or encouragement worked. I jumped back in to help, but he was too heavy to lift and each rescue attempt ended in failure.

We decided a stepladder might provide the needed assistance. I told my pet we would be right back (I really believed he could understand me) and hightailed it to find a ladder. Only a few hurried steps on my journey and my faithful dog was by my side.

Overjoyed, I bent down and gave him a grateful hug. Apparently, as long as he could see me, he wasn’t too concerned, but once I faded from view, his panic of being left alone gave enough extra incentive to try harder.

In both these cases, panic helped these animals do something they wouldn’t have otherwise done. The same is true with people; when a panic occurs, we can do extraordinary things. There is power in panic.

Do you like this post? Want to read more? Check out Peter’s book, Bridging the Sacred-Secular Divide: Discovering the Spirituality of Every Day Life, available wherever books are sold.

Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices. Read more in his books, blog, and weekly email updates.

One Friday we received some much-needed rain—1.8 inches in just a couple hours; it was a downpour.

The following day, to my dismay, I noticed that Robin’s nest had been knocked out of my crabapple tree. I was saddened to see three unhatched eggs on the ground. They had been deserted; it was too late to do anything about it.

(Even had I discovered them right away, the chance of keeping them warm enough to hatch would have been a long shot, not to mention nurturing them if they hatched.)

Interestingly, the nest was intact. The problem was that it wasn’t adequately anchored to the tree. I could see where it once was attached and though it was at a “Y” it was surely not an optimal one.

Additionally, since Robins often lay eggs twice a year, these parents will need to build a second nest if they intend to try again.

As a nature lover, I derive great joy through the life of animals. Although dead animals are a real and natural part of nature, it is a side that I prefer to overlook. Yes, I know about natural selection and the survival of the fittest.

Unfortunately, these babies didn’t stand a chance because their parents didn’t build a stronger, better nest. It is a small consolation to know that this particular trait is being effectively removed from the gene pool.

The lesson in this is to be careful on what foundation we build—make sure it is a firm one. Rarely in the US does this have literal life and death ramifications, but in other parts of the world it does, primarily the third-world parts.

In other situations, the wrong foundation could be living in a bad neighborhood, sending your kids to an ineffective  school, starting a business without a plan or enough capital, investing in a shaky opportunity, and so forth.

Just as with building bird nests, it is important that we find the right foundation and carefully build upon it. The consequences of not doing so can be dire.

Do you like this post? Want to read more? Check out Peter’s book, Bridging the Sacred-Secular Divide: Discovering the Spirituality of Every Day Life, available wherever books are sold.

Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices. Read more in his books, blog, and weekly email updates.

I’ve blogged about squirrels in my yard, which I see on a daily basis and rabbits in my yard, which I see almost as often. This is not the case with raccoons. I’ve never seen a raccoon near my house, at least not until a couple weeks ago.

I was outside as dawn was peaking forth, setting the lawn sprinklers for the day. Not fully awake, I walked around my house, looked up, and was startled to see a raccoon lumbering across my yard, headed in my direction. I froze. What should I do?

Do I yell to scare him off? Chase him away? Ignore him?

In my early morning stupor, I conjured up a comedy/horror skit, which flooded my mind.

I envisioned him rearing up on his hind legs and running towards me. With lightning quickness he would attack, mouth foaming and eyes ablaze with anger. Before I could react, he would leap into the air, hit my chest, and pin me to the ground. Then he would…

I shuttered, trying to shake my over-active imagination from my foggy mind. It was not logical but filled me with fear just the same.

I clapped once to get his attention. He looked up with a start. He, too, was in a predawn stupor. To my relief, he made a U-turn and waddled out of sight. He was not full-grown, but with quite a tummy on him, he was apparently well-fed.

I recalled my next-door neighbor catching two adult raccoons in her live animal trap earlier this spring. I wondered if those were his folks. The trap was still set in her yard, ready for a third, but this lad was too clever.

If he was an orphan, he was doing okay, avoiding capture and finding plenty to eat.

Mr. Raccoon, I hope you have a long life and a happy life—just do it in someone else’s yard.

Do you like this post? Want to read more? Check out Peter’s book, Bridging the Sacred-Secular Divide: Discovering the Spirituality of Every Day Life, available wherever books are sold.

Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices. Read more in his books, blog, and weekly email updates.