Mourning Birds are Loving

by Laurie
(Maryland)

We feed the birds in our area and mostly get Mourning Doves of which we are particularly fond, but also get those darling Golden Finches, a few Cardinals, and all kinds of sparrows.

In early fall, 2010, we noticed a young male Cardinal in our tiny back yard hopping around. Later when our back yard light came on (it is very dim) we noticed he was still there although all the other birds were gone. My husband said he would go get him because he might not be able to figure out how to fly over the fence. I said maybe we should wait until daylight to get him so we could put him on the fence to see if he could fly away.

Later in the evening, he went behind a bush and we couldn't see him. But even though it was dark we noticed a female Mourning Dove sitting in the bush where the young Cardinal was hiding. She was still there hours later. Then around 8 p.m. she flew away. The next morning we found the little Cardinal dead.

I believe the Mourning Dove stayed with him as he was dying. I love the Mourning Doves. They sometimes sit on the window sill and look inside at us.