Celebration of Birds!

The first time I came into Hageboeck Hall of Birds three years ago, I was quickly overwhelmed.

The Hageboeck Hall of Birds, on the third floor of Macbride, is home to what seems like endless birds.  Wings posed in mid flight, each bird seems to look at something in an unreachable distance.  Owls, gulls, toucans, turkeys, ostrich eggs – all represented here behind glass cases.  With all these birds to look at, where do you start?

After some time in the museum, I’ve learned to start with the owls.  Sometimes I imagine I’m at the owl emporium in Harry Potter, selecting an owl companion to take my messages by post; other times, I’m traveling through a snowy forest.  The owls look haughty, but never mean; to me, they’re old and wise and full of good stories.

After the owls, I like to look at the eagles.  At times, if I listen carefully, I feel like I can hear a national anthem stirring in the warm air of the gallery.  Unlike the owls, who sit and watch the world around them, these guys are driven (to continue the Harry Potter metaphor, the hawks are almost certainly Slytherins).  But they’re also observant – an eagle’s vision is close to four times better than a human’s, and I wonder if they see things in the world that we can’t see, or don’t notice.

I then flit around the different cases – jays, magpies, ravens, and warblers – to find my favorite birds, the sparrows and songbirds.  Sparrows are little and brown, not as striking as the wise old owl or the observant, ruthless eagle.  There are different families of sparrows represented at the museum, and although an experienced birdwatcher could probably tell them apart, to me they’re all still birds that want to sing a song.

Across from the sparrows is a colorful display case of gulls – they remind me of the Australian gulls in Finding Nemo, calling “mine” over and over to assert ownership.  Go a little farther from the gulls and sparrows and you’ll end up in the cyclorama – a 360-degree diorama, one of the last ones out there. If I look carefully, I can stand on an island shore, looking at birds and feeling the cool, salty air.

Photo Courtesy of Kice Brown

And only ten minutes ago, I was buying an owl with Harry Potter.

Every bird, whether it’s a turkey or a sparrow, comes from some place special, whether it’s a forest or your backyard, Australia or Antarctica, often places we’ve never been. Flying above us, birds have seen a much larger share of the world than many of us do; it’s easy to envy a bird for its freedom, its effortless flight.  Visiting Bird Hall lets us see these birds in a way we can’t see when they’re speeding past us or singing from a tree – it lets us appreciate the owl’s quiet strength, the tiny grace of a sparrow. And that’s what I love about it.

On Bird Day, we don’t have to become professional birdwatchers, or bird scientists.  But we can still learn from the birds.  We can learn from their travels and from their inherent beauty, and that matters most.  The next time we hear a bird chirping or watch one past us, we can wonder what stories that bird might tell.  

-Written by MNH Volunteer Catherine Babikian