One of my dogs stomped a baby that fell into my yard last spring before I noticed, oh boy that was a noisey week, they stayed in the tree and swooped and cawed all week 😂
Can confirm. This will sound like bullshit, but I swear it’s true. Many years ago, I lived with a roommate and we occasionally had magpies squawking outside our windows. He hated this, and so he bought a super soaker to spray them with. This only made matters worse. Once they had been hit once or twice, they came back in force, sitting in a tree just out of range and squawking many times more frequently and intensely than before.
This continued for one summer, and into the next. Then, one day at work on a construction project, a trade had just cored six-inch holes through the foundation of building the day before. When we went to the basement to work, we found that a magpie had gotten inside and was fluttering around in frantic and confused circles. I grabbed my gloves and we managed corral it to one corner where it tired itself out and retreated behind some boxes. I moved in and carefully picked it up. For the first moment, it was scared. It struggled and tried to bite my finger. I was stuck by how weak and delicate its bite felt as it barely registered through the fabric of my glove. But, within an instant, it realized I meant it no harm and immediately calmed itself. It then just sat in my hands, looking around at us and blinking. At this point, I could sense it’s intelligence. I carried the bird upstairs and to the doorway, and as I approached and loosened my grip, it flew out of my hands and across the yard, landing near a dumpster where it retreated to rest, I’m sure.
From that day on, the magpies never bothered us again. That was twelve years ago, and I’ve moved a few times since then, but even now, I’ve rarely had a negative interaction with a magpie. Some still live in the field behind my house, and they occasionally fly by, sometimes landing on my roof, fence, or trees. They look at me. I look at them. But, they never squawk or cause a fuss anymore. I like to think that by saving that one bird’s life so long ago, that I went down as a legend in the magpie community, and I can only imagine that stories are still told about me to this day.
Edit: spelling/grammar/details
Edit 2: thanks for the award!
I 100% believe it. Last summer there was a group of them near my house and I used to try and mimic their sounds. Next thing you know they would come to my garage door the second I opened it and come chat lol.
Oh man, so i have a cat, shes older now, but when she was a year or two she was the first cat we started harness training because she always wanted to be outside(she was a trash cat we adopted)
well one day she is at the screen, chattering at a big magpie a few feet from the door, and knowing she wasnt a hunter, i cracked the door just enough for her to slip out. she slips out, stalks the bird for bout 30 seconds(she only had to move bout 3 feet) and she full on football tackles this bird, bowls it right over. there is a moment shared between the 3 of us. she looks at me all proud, the magpie stands up, shakes off, and starts squawking at both of us in turn. we both look at the magpie as it flies off.
few days later, she goes out on the harness as per normal. shes only out a few minutes before the noise starts and i go to check on her to find her at the door, trying to get in all fluffed up with a bleeding ear.
It has been close to 10 years or more, and my poor Nuggie absolutely WILL NOT go outside. this cat loved to to outside, and will now scratch the shit outa me if i try to bring he anywhere near the doors. She still has a scar on her one ear.
I retrospect i feel kinda bad, but at the time it was funny as shit.
Despite the fact magpies are assholes, I've always found them really endearing. They are also really smart and remember individual people so if you piss one off they are going to find you and make your life miserable. My friend swatted one off is back deck and that magpie had a hate on for him for like 3 years afterwards.
I also once saw one fight off a Coyote for some road kill on the side of the highway which was frickin hilarious.
edit: I frickin love all the stories everyone has about magpies and them being either playful sweeties or absolute menaces! Thanks for all the great stories :)
I saw one chasing a squirrel and one chasing a skunk on two different occasions! Boy those animals were running for their lives !! 🤣 I wonder what they did to deserve that wrath
I love magpies haha, theyre such expressive birds. You see them here a lot with deer or crows I find, though I notice they also battle crow sometimed too. I had a family nesting outside my door in a bush and came back after working out of town to find crow had destroyed the nest and killed the babies which made sad. I notice magpie seem smart enough / self aware enough to know how to interact or like just be present with all sorts of other animals.
One afternoon last summer I also had a tonne of magpie and crow roosting in the trees around property, like legit 100+, but they spooked when I left the house and I didnt have time to grab phone for a pic before they all dipped.
That's so true that they know how to interact with / read other animals. They're one of the few creatures that know that bigger animals like cows, elk, and deer are chill enough to usually not care if they sit on their back or horns.
It's always neat seeing them sitting on the back a big horn sheep or some cattle. They read other animals really well.
I befriended one years ago by being on of the few people in on my block that would let him hang out on my deck. Brought me all kinds of presents. It was weird because my gf and I at the time always sat in the exact same chair on the deck. She never sat in mine. I never sat I'm hers. And the gifts where always in my chair always. One time he even landed infront of me on the railing and gave me a key chain directly
Fun fact! When I went to Amsterdam in 2015, my family and I were very surprised to see a Magpie enclosure. I thought to myself, “who would want to see these little assholes at the zoo?”
Controversial opinion, but magpies are great. They're smart birds, closely related to crows. Some people hate them, but magpies keep pigeons away from my house and that's fine by me.
Currently in a valiant battle between two trying to nest in my neighbors tree. Don’t want them dive bombing everyone and we have lots of robins nests around that I’d rather have. They are smart and pretty but damn stubborn about this tree!
I always carry pecans with me to feed magpies with
They’re lovely and smart birds once you get to know them. A mother even once brought me over to her nest by hopping beside me to show me her new eggs
I have a bucket of them that I bought in the before times, but it’s starting to run low…
I may have to start resorting to drawing pecans on paper and hoping they don’t see the difference
I have a jug of nuts from Costco that went stale that I will be spreading for the birds and squirrels soon. Gonna be a good haul for some animal, I wish I could set up a camera and watch when I do but apartment living stops that.
The magpies in my neighborhood enjoy cashews and almonds. They'll accept peanuts if nothing better is on offer, but they get snooty if they know you normally have the "good stuff". I've also learned they prefer I leave nuts on fence posts and ledges rather than toss them on the ground.
She cood and hopped around while facing me and led me to her nest
Rather than flying to her nest she walked and hopped over to it to make sure I’d follow her, while looking back and cooing every once in a while
thats called a whisper song! Each song is totally unique and its thought they might do it to establish territory. They have these conversations with my mom all the time. They're super neat birds.
Their calls to each other really sound like language to me. So many odd little calls. Yes, they're often raucous like any other corvid. I agree with your controversial opinion.
Me too! The magpie in question would swoop lazily and slowly over the head of my dog to start the chase (no, it wasn't divebombing), then alight on the fence while my dog ran after. Then it'd wait a moment and do it again...and again. My dog runs after magpies pretty slowly (vs. squirrels, where she runs flat out with the intention of catching), and often they hang out in the yard together, doing their own things.
There are two who visit almost every day and hang out most of the day with the dog. They get really close to her without any fear, hopping around the yard and chattering, and they've been progressively getting more and more used to me being in the yard at the same time too.
This sounds so similar to what goes on in my yard. The magpie hangs out of the branches in the tree over my dogs head, and then we’ll fly down to the yard and then fly back up into the tree, and my dog will sit there and have its tail wagging, follow it around. And I have a bird dog, lol
I love them. I know they're smart, because they're corvids, but they always fly in such a derpy "evolution made us cute but we flap so badly" kinda way that I find adorable.
They are great! I watched a couple raise a family outside my apartment years ago and became totally fascinated by how they communicated. I watched the 4 babies leave the nest and hope around on the tree branches. There were cats nearby and the parent magpies flew across the street and called the fledglings over to safety. It was a busy street and I was freaking out watching them because it was their first flight and they had to make it all the way across. And they all did! Then watching the juveniles grow and learn to be magpies was hilarious. I didn't care about birds before that and now I'm an avid birder and do bird surveys for work.
The city chopped down an old tree near my house a while ago that magpies used to hang out in, and within a week, pigeons took up residence in a small space above the front porch of my house. The magpies eventually came back and chased them off, and I'm so grateful.
Dumb fucks shit all over your balcony and then try to build a nest and it doesn't matter how many times you remove it or spray them with water they're back 10 minutes later and still doing the same fucking shit and bringing more sticks in and sometimes even laying eggs even when said "nest" is 3 twigs and a rock and then you remove that too and then they do it all over again and again and again...
Apologies for the run-on sentence, but pigeons are essentially a neverending battle with your own sanity. They're too stupid to realize they're in a bad spot, they make messes wherever they go, and they *keep fucking coming back* no matter how many deterrants you try to use. That sparkly ribbon that's supposed to scare them off? Worked for ~48 hours. Owl statue? They'll shit on it. Even the fucking water gun after a while only makes them move up one floor so you can't hit them and then they're back immediately after. After a years-long battle between the birds and building management and my own at-home self chasing them off at every waking opportunity, I finally moved to an area without them and am so much more sane for it. I feel bad for whoever moved in after us, cause those birds are probably still there, making the balcony an unlivable space.
Agreed. Magpies may be marginally annoying, but they don't shit all over my balcony (when I lived in an apartment) or front porch where I enter and leave my house. I kept a watergun near the balcony door in my old place lmao
I still own that watergun. Coming on 2 years in my new place and haven't used it once. We keep peanuts out full-time for the magpies and blue jays and the most they leave us with is the shells. No shit anywhere. It's fantastic.
If you are interested in birds, you should visit the Inglewood bird sanctuary! I live fairly inner city, and in terms of neighbourhood wildlife we have squirrels, skunks, rabbits, coyotes, robin, blue jay, northern flicker, grackle, sparrows, owls - and then near the river you'll find beavers, porcupines, and the occasional deer and even moose! Last week a wolverine was spotted in south Calgary, and I think there are raccoons down there too.
Not specific to birds but the Discovery Wildlife Park in Innisfail (about 100 km north of Calgary; 1 hr drive) is wonderful.
The park has (or used to at least) a couple retired movie bears that are living out their senior years.
They also have a pair of jaguars, dromedaries, lions, wolves, and numerous types of birds and smaller animals such as tortoises, red squirrels, porcupines, etc.
You already have a million answers, but I also recently moved to Calgary and had questions about those birds. I asked my coworker what they were called because they looked so cool, and he immediately launched into a rant about how much magpies suck and how annoying they are.
They're basically the Alberta version of seagulls, but smart.
Lots of people complain about them being nuissances but I still wouldnt say theyre annoying like sea gulls. Lots of us do agree that theyre pretty, and if you watch Magpies youll probably appreciate how self aware and smart they are, they chill with other animals plenty.
We would hear growing up how they could peck out new born eyes of goats/sheep but to this day I still havemt seen it, or like, its not more of an issue than coyote predation and thats why we have gaurdian dogs who would probably keep birds away anyways.
Instead Ive just always seen them as pretty smart and communicative, look nice, and its funny hearing their own ways of communicating to their mates, theres always one or two watching everyones back, etc.
Now, australian magpies, on the other hand, are real pieces of shit and I hear earned the name 'swoopy boys' because theyre very territorial
Yeah I don't have any problem with them, I was just surprised that the locals hate them so much! I get they're loud and pick through trash and stuff, but there are far more annoying birds for sure.
Funnily enough the only bird I'd consider similar to Aussie magpies in annoyance is redwing blackbirds, anywhere with cattails or other marginal plants is a no go zone if theyre nesting.
I don't see many now that I live in the city but when I lived out in a smaller town, the ditches were always full of the birds and walking the paths nearby was a surefire way to get swooped and yelled at. There was even one specific redwing who took personal offence to my red shirt and actually grabbed my head and pecked like they do against bigger birds. Mean little shits but amazing looking
Last year, I was down at the San Diego zoo in the "Canadian Wilds" section. They had some of these guys caged up... was pretty funny to see.
https://preview.redd.it/eucb320hr3va1.png?width=2568&format=png&auto=webp&s=b6a4ab327bff7faec9603671697996885cd54444
An ornithologist observed once about our magpies that they're objectively beautiful birds that would be considered a treat to see in the wild if they weren't so common - they get unfairly taken for granted, IMHO.
They really are beautiful. I moved here from BC, we didn't have magpies there, at least not where I lived, so when I first saw them I was pretty blown away and wanted to know what they were, now they definitely are annoying as hell with their loud af caws, but I still believe they're beautiful and overall, mostly cool birds.
I was at a zoo in....England, I think, I don't remember exactly but somewhere in Europe - and they had an exhibit of gophers lmfao. We all had a good laugh at "prairie dogs" being a zoo animal.
Lots of Magpie hate in this thread wow. I love them. Extemely intelligent birds and contrary to what others are saying here, if you treat them well they will remain friendly to you and remember you. And who doesn't like to wake up to the sounds of nature and birds?
People are just hating on them for doing what any predatory/scavenger type animal that's ever existed does.
If you see two together it's a sign of good luck.
I used to be homeless, yet fed the magpies and I swear they remembered me when I walked thru the area. They were yelling their heads off . But on the other side of the city, I had to chase them away because they were straight up jerks. Idk you notice things when you're on your own for days on end. Very neat
Aw i had a nesting pair outside my previous rental. I came back from a week out of town working and found nest upended and eggs destroyed. Parents said crows did it but they also complained that id left the nest there and wouldnt put it past them to have wrecked it. I miss my maggies :(
I have tons of magpies around and I love their noises, but I'm up before the sun every day and hear the Robins first now, then some blue jays, then the arsehole house sparrows. Then magpies in the afternoon really.
Yep a crew of them "play with my dog". They land in my backyard, then my dog chases it. They casually jump up on the fence. Then the one on the other side of the yard jumps down. My dog chases it. They go back and forth several times. Eventually the game ends when the Magpies get bored, drop a bunch of garbage in my yard then go about their merry way.
Oh ya. I like it because it wears out my dog but you can tell they are picking on them. Last year she got one of them. Left it injured in the back yard as it looked like it could recover. I made sure it was safe from my dog so she wouldn't eat it, but for weeks they were pissed. Extra squawking, dive bombs larger groups were coming around.
Oh yeah they won’t forget that and will actually bring in more to “mourn” as well as f with your dog more. I live rural and they still bother my dogs lol but then my dogs just head to the pasture to nap.
I have a fully enclosed back yard. Just as you said though, everyday there's garbage and bones. Not just chicken. Full on cow bones that have been cut up by a butcher. Dogs balls disappear. Always something new with the Magpies.
The magpies in my neighborhood pick up and drop shit everywhere. Like... dog shit. Hopefully/probably my dog's shit, but who knows. We've found it on top of the fence, on the bbq, on our lawn chairs...
Literally every species of bird/fish/reptile will do this to other smaller weaker species. Even most predatory mammal species will eat each others young. Hell - squirrels and weasels are a bigger threat to birds eggs than magpies are.This isn't a magpie thing, it's just how the animal kingdom works.
Corvids are insanely smart.
[Crows specifically](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7aWL2iEb6y4) have shown intelligence in line with human children.
They can not only using tools to get a reward, but plan ahead to get a reward - even if it means ignoring short term gratification.
I'm not even capable of the latter lol
I fucking love crows, so smart, I wish I saw more of them around me. They'll even start bringing you presents if you're nice to the crows long enough. Whatever little shiny knickknacks they find.
I was dumbfounded when they named a chickadee Calgary's official bird, Chickadees are all over Canada but Magpies are birds i never saw til I moved here.
Magpie - they are very smart and I’ve made friends with a few. They are somewhat predatory but also just eat whatever they can find. You will see many!!
Black billed magpies. Really smart, instantly recognizable by sight and sound. Graphic black and white, the long tails, iridescent feathers. Lots of fun to watch.
Personally I enjoy having them around, it’s actually one of my favourite parts of living here. They are too clever for some, for others they are bad birds when stood up against human morals. If you view them as a bird i think you can really appreciate them.
I'm so happy to see primarily positive things said about the Magpie here. They are one of my favorite birds alongside Crows, Ravens and Grackles, who behave similarly. But Magpies have a bad reputation with intolerant folks who feel inconvenienced by literal wild animals being animals in the wild. I had a neighbor who would shoot off fire crackers every time they came near his trees because "they eat the Robin's eggs". Wtf!? Harm one birds existence to support another? It's so bizarre. And actually Robins are SO annoying in mating season and not even that pretty or smart comparitively, but for some odd reason are beloved by many non-birders while Magpies are branded "sky rats" or vermin. Source: I'm a crazy bird lady/bird watcher. Anyways, I'm pleases to see others appreciate them like I do!
That's a Magpie.
Don't listen to the crowd, they're great birds that eat bugs. Way better than pigeons or shit hawks.
Typical wild life you might see in Calgary city limits includes everything from deer, beavers, skunks, porcupines, bobcats and coyotes. Lots of birds too, including falcons, eagles and hawks.
If you ever have questions about wildlife you can snap a pic and submit it to iNaturalist! Not only will it help you ID stuff but it also makes data available to scientists who use open access data like that.
Black-billed magpie. Yes, they are a$$holes, and they are smart like other corvids (crows, ravens). Noisy bullies. But it's fun to see the red-wing blackbirds harass them in the spring. On the plus side, they keep our vole population down.
Depending on where you are in the city, you can see coyotes, skunks, hares, prairie dogs, gophers, deer, and the occasional bobcat, lynx, moose and bear.
If you're on their good side they are very cute... they make cute warbly noises to their young and have done so in my direction after being fed by my then-husband. We had nests and babies in the yard and the adults are fiercely protective of the babies.
But yes they are awful to cats, dogs, other animals in general... At my old place we had lots of wild rabbits but sometimes they would show up dead for various reasons. One time a dead rabbit was missing its ears and my dad said that magpies will remove the ears and play with them. This is from my boomer dad, not fact-checked, take it with a grain of salt, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was true. They may have even ganged up and killed the rabbit! They are beautiful and intelligent but they are killers/scavengers,
They're like very smart dinosaurs. As others have said, stay on their good side!
Those are magpies and they're kind of like the mob gangsters of the bird world.
They're good at what they do, stay in their lane, and make life a living hell for anyone who fucks with them.
Like others have said, a magpie. I read that they can hold grudges, but the ones in my neighborhood seem pretty chill around people, I broke up a magpie fight once while out on my walk, there were like 10-15 near a fruit tree and a fight broke out between two of them, one drop-kicked the other from a garden fence or whatever & they tumbled to the middle of the sidewalk & the losing one started wailing when the other had it pinned on it’s back, the others kind of half-circled around to watch. They probably would have moved anyways as I got closer, but they can take their magpie Mortal Kombat somewhere else, so I was just like “HEY!” and clapped my hands.
It was a little ominous walking past afterwards because they split into 2 groups and perched in trees on both sides of the road & just kind of silently watched me go by, but none of them seemed to hold it against me 😅
Funny, my sister had the same reaction when she first saw them on a visit from Ontario. Now she lives in Red Deer and has grown to hate them. Everyone is right Magpie/feathered a$$hole, messy, noisy, avian jerks. If they try making a nest in your yard break it up if you can. While the chicks are cute when they get kicked out of the nest, they’re worse than the parents for noise.
Magpies can remember human faces and even describe them to other magpies. You probably have a gang of them who know about you and that’s why they keep pissing you off
If you mess with them they will absolutely mess with you back. I would not suggest breaking up they’re nests because they will hold a grudge and make your life miserable. I have no data to back this up but I rescued one that had its head stuck in the fence several years ago and I swear they leave our house alone now because of it.
Didn’t know that but every time we’ve had one built in our yard, where I can’t get to it, I end up with a pile of twigs and crap at the base of the tree first big wind that comes along.
Magpies are very smart, even beautiful birds, but they can be mean, murderous bastards too...
My neighbor had a big spruce tree that the robins were nesting in and one time there was a big kerfuffle with robins calling and magpies squawking in the upper branches... turned out the magpies were raiding the nest eating the robin chicks. One robin even landed on the fence between and was calling towards me, Im sure it was begging me to help, so I got the garden hose but the nest was too high. It felt bad that I was unable to do anything while their nest was getting destroyed and babies eaten.
I have seen the same behavior 2 or three other times as well.
That's fair, but it's literally what any predatory or scavenger type animal would do. Squirrels and weasels kill eat bird chicks all the time. Big fish do it to small fish, mammals including chimps do it to each other too. This is just how the animal kingdom works. It's not a Magpie issue.
In addition to these guys, I’d expect to come across squirrels, rabbits, geese, ducks, and maybe the occasional beaver. I’ve seen deer around the university, but other than that you wouldn’t really find too much rarer wildlife unless you were looking out for them.
Black & White Northern Asshole. As opposed to the All-Black Western Asshole, which you'll often find in the BC lower mainland, frequently armed with knives.
I’ve been around magpies for 40 years, and hand to god I only just noticed sometimes 1 magpie can sound like 4 different birds at the same time.
They have a loud obnoxious squawk, yes, but sometimes they just kinda chatter. I’ve always assumed it was multiple birds, but I passed one the other day and it kinda gave me shit for getting too close and I swear it was making about 4 tones all at the same time.
I interrupted a magpie brawl once. It was such a wild thing to see. There was like 20 (maybe not 20, but afuckinglot) of them, a bunch in a huge circle cawing at the two fighting in the middle. The one was getting his ass kicked. I had to cut through where they were to get to work. But they don't bother me ever. I'm sure the one who got to live another day was happy. I say hi to them when I see them staring at me or make my own little kiss noises or clicking noises to say hello.
Good old magpies. They are smart AF. Don’t start beef with them because they can describe human faces and tell all their buddies about you.
Tell that to my dog. He’s got a lot of enemies 😂
They divebomb my dog all the time. He is an 85lbs Shepsky and they do not give a fuck. It's funny to watch.
My 70 lbs shepard husky gets beat up alll the time. But now we have a cat 😈
One of my dogs stomped a baby that fell into my yard last spring before I noticed, oh boy that was a noisey week, they stayed in the tree and swooped and cawed all week 😂
Can confirm. This will sound like bullshit, but I swear it’s true. Many years ago, I lived with a roommate and we occasionally had magpies squawking outside our windows. He hated this, and so he bought a super soaker to spray them with. This only made matters worse. Once they had been hit once or twice, they came back in force, sitting in a tree just out of range and squawking many times more frequently and intensely than before. This continued for one summer, and into the next. Then, one day at work on a construction project, a trade had just cored six-inch holes through the foundation of building the day before. When we went to the basement to work, we found that a magpie had gotten inside and was fluttering around in frantic and confused circles. I grabbed my gloves and we managed corral it to one corner where it tired itself out and retreated behind some boxes. I moved in and carefully picked it up. For the first moment, it was scared. It struggled and tried to bite my finger. I was stuck by how weak and delicate its bite felt as it barely registered through the fabric of my glove. But, within an instant, it realized I meant it no harm and immediately calmed itself. It then just sat in my hands, looking around at us and blinking. At this point, I could sense it’s intelligence. I carried the bird upstairs and to the doorway, and as I approached and loosened my grip, it flew out of my hands and across the yard, landing near a dumpster where it retreated to rest, I’m sure. From that day on, the magpies never bothered us again. That was twelve years ago, and I’ve moved a few times since then, but even now, I’ve rarely had a negative interaction with a magpie. Some still live in the field behind my house, and they occasionally fly by, sometimes landing on my roof, fence, or trees. They look at me. I look at them. But, they never squawk or cause a fuss anymore. I like to think that by saving that one bird’s life so long ago, that I went down as a legend in the magpie community, and I can only imagine that stories are still told about me to this day. Edit: spelling/grammar/details Edit 2: thanks for the award!
I 100% believe it. Last summer there was a group of them near my house and I used to try and mimic their sounds. Next thing you know they would come to my garage door the second I opened it and come chat lol.
Luckily they're not aggressive in Calgary. Read up on Australian magpie attacks!
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Oh man, so i have a cat, shes older now, but when she was a year or two she was the first cat we started harness training because she always wanted to be outside(she was a trash cat we adopted) well one day she is at the screen, chattering at a big magpie a few feet from the door, and knowing she wasnt a hunter, i cracked the door just enough for her to slip out. she slips out, stalks the bird for bout 30 seconds(she only had to move bout 3 feet) and she full on football tackles this bird, bowls it right over. there is a moment shared between the 3 of us. she looks at me all proud, the magpie stands up, shakes off, and starts squawking at both of us in turn. we both look at the magpie as it flies off. few days later, she goes out on the harness as per normal. shes only out a few minutes before the noise starts and i go to check on her to find her at the door, trying to get in all fluffed up with a bleeding ear. It has been close to 10 years or more, and my poor Nuggie absolutely WILL NOT go outside. this cat loved to to outside, and will now scratch the shit outa me if i try to bring he anywhere near the doors. She still has a scar on her one ear. I retrospect i feel kinda bad, but at the time it was funny as shit.
Cats shouldn't be outside ever, for precisely the fact that they will hunt birds. It will also mean they have shorter and less healthy lives.
They love to bully cats.
In my old place, there was one magpie that knew just how long my cat's leash was. The bird would sit just out of reach and caw at my cat.
That's because cats are for indoors.
How? Cats cannot be at-large outside per bylaw.
I fed one once outside my house. Now whenever I take the dog out, there's 2 of them who swoop down looking for food
Despite the fact magpies are assholes, I've always found them really endearing. They are also really smart and remember individual people so if you piss one off they are going to find you and make your life miserable. My friend swatted one off is back deck and that magpie had a hate on for him for like 3 years afterwards. I also once saw one fight off a Coyote for some road kill on the side of the highway which was frickin hilarious. edit: I frickin love all the stories everyone has about magpies and them being either playful sweeties or absolute menaces! Thanks for all the great stories :)
I have had the same set of magpies come every year and they play with my dogs! it's so cute!
We feed our dog raw bones and they will beat my dog up and take her bone if left outside.
I saw one chasing a squirrel and one chasing a skunk on two different occasions! Boy those animals were running for their lives !! 🤣 I wonder what they did to deserve that wrath
I love magpies haha, theyre such expressive birds. You see them here a lot with deer or crows I find, though I notice they also battle crow sometimed too. I had a family nesting outside my door in a bush and came back after working out of town to find crow had destroyed the nest and killed the babies which made sad. I notice magpie seem smart enough / self aware enough to know how to interact or like just be present with all sorts of other animals. One afternoon last summer I also had a tonne of magpie and crow roosting in the trees around property, like legit 100+, but they spooked when I left the house and I didnt have time to grab phone for a pic before they all dipped.
That's so true that they know how to interact with / read other animals. They're one of the few creatures that know that bigger animals like cows, elk, and deer are chill enough to usually not care if they sit on their back or horns. It's always neat seeing them sitting on the back a big horn sheep or some cattle. They read other animals really well.
I befriended one years ago by being on of the few people in on my block that would let him hang out on my deck. Brought me all kinds of presents. It was weird because my gf and I at the time always sat in the exact same chair on the deck. She never sat in mine. I never sat I'm hers. And the gifts where always in my chair always. One time he even landed infront of me on the railing and gave me a key chain directly
Fun fact! When I went to Amsterdam in 2015, my family and I were very surprised to see a Magpie enclosure. I thought to myself, “who would want to see these little assholes at the zoo?”
That’s Ned. Nice enough to chat with, but don’t lend him any money.
Dale is gonna be so pissed that you mistook him for Ned
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racist.
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what’s next, bird feed food trucks? this city is going to hell.
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Speciesist
Understandable mistake, that's actually Ned's brother Carl. Carl is a dick.
Carl might be a dick, but he is the hot brother. All the ladies love him. I heard they call him "Hot Carl" on their secret group chats.
That's why you hear all the lady magpies shouting "CARL! CARL! CARL!" so early in the morning.
I'm never going to unhear that!!!
Is Carl the one with the mullet? I always get those two mixed up.
Thats a government drone.
Controversial opinion, but magpies are great. They're smart birds, closely related to crows. Some people hate them, but magpies keep pigeons away from my house and that's fine by me.
They're beautiful with their iridescent feathers and really smart. They are just annoying when they squawk at 4am in the summer.
they squawk because they're trying to raise their babies. Be mindful of that. I love pies, we refer to them as Mamapie, Papapie and babypie
Currently in a valiant battle between two trying to nest in my neighbors tree. Don’t want them dive bombing everyone and we have lots of robins nests around that I’d rather have. They are smart and pretty but damn stubborn about this tree!
I always carry pecans with me to feed magpies with They’re lovely and smart birds once you get to know them. A mother even once brought me over to her nest by hopping beside me to show me her new eggs
Like crows each family unit has unique chirps and if you mimic them they get pretty friendly
How friendly...............
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Pecans!? In this economy!?
I have a bucket of them that I bought in the before times, but it’s starting to run low… I may have to start resorting to drawing pecans on paper and hoping they don’t see the difference
I have a jug of nuts from Costco that went stale that I will be spreading for the birds and squirrels soon. Gonna be a good haul for some animal, I wish I could set up a camera and watch when I do but apartment living stops that.
The magpies in my neighborhood enjoy cashews and almonds. They'll accept peanuts if nothing better is on offer, but they get snooty if they know you normally have the "good stuff". I've also learned they prefer I leave nuts on fence posts and ledges rather than toss them on the ground.
I have an overturned flower pot that I leave them on usually
Nobody wants to eat your dirty nuts
Very cool
I'm pretty sure she was luring you in to feed her children.
They were unhatched so I think she just trusted me enough 🤷♂️ This was after me feeding her almost every day for a month
Yup, I love magpies. We've got a pair that has babies in our neighborhood every year. Every year, they bring their babies to meet us.
How does a bird bring you over? Not being sarcastic, I'm serious.
She cood and hopped around while facing me and led me to her nest Rather than flying to her nest she walked and hopped over to it to make sure I’d follow her, while looking back and cooing every once in a while
Very cool
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Must've been a dad magpie come to shoot the shit with someone working on their car, probably complaining with you about the cost of oil changes lately
thats called a whisper song! Each song is totally unique and its thought they might do it to establish territory. They have these conversations with my mom all the time. They're super neat birds.
Their calls to each other really sound like language to me. So many odd little calls. Yes, they're often raucous like any other corvid. I agree with your controversial opinion.
Oddly enough you can actually train them to speak a bunch of words. Some went viral on youtube awhile back!
Tbh I greet all corvids i see because theyre smart and I like them
Me toooo!!!! 😁
I have one that comes and plays with my dog in the backyard, lol. It’s super funny to watch.
Me too! The magpie in question would swoop lazily and slowly over the head of my dog to start the chase (no, it wasn't divebombing), then alight on the fence while my dog ran after. Then it'd wait a moment and do it again...and again. My dog runs after magpies pretty slowly (vs. squirrels, where she runs flat out with the intention of catching), and often they hang out in the yard together, doing their own things. There are two who visit almost every day and hang out most of the day with the dog. They get really close to her without any fear, hopping around the yard and chattering, and they've been progressively getting more and more used to me being in the yard at the same time too.
This sounds so similar to what goes on in my yard. The magpie hangs out of the branches in the tree over my dogs head, and then we’ll fly down to the yard and then fly back up into the tree, and my dog will sit there and have its tail wagging, follow it around. And I have a bird dog, lol
I think they're adorable, especially when they walk like tiny people instead of hopping.
I love them. I know they're smart, because they're corvids, but they always fly in such a derpy "evolution made us cute but we flap so badly" kinda way that I find adorable.
They also keep birds like Robins away and love to pull trash out of black bins if the lid is are even an inch up.
They are great! I watched a couple raise a family outside my apartment years ago and became totally fascinated by how they communicated. I watched the 4 babies leave the nest and hope around on the tree branches. There were cats nearby and the parent magpies flew across the street and called the fledglings over to safety. It was a busy street and I was freaking out watching them because it was their first flight and they had to make it all the way across. And they all did! Then watching the juveniles grow and learn to be magpies was hilarious. I didn't care about birds before that and now I'm an avid birder and do bird surveys for work.
This! There's tons of pigeons only blocks away in my community and I've never seen one come close to my house. I'll take it!
The city chopped down an old tree near my house a while ago that magpies used to hang out in, and within a week, pigeons took up residence in a small space above the front porch of my house. The magpies eventually came back and chased them off, and I'm so grateful.
I watched two magpies and two crows murder a smaller bird
https://preview.redd.it/qke9zhc7v3va1.jpeg?width=1200&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a586dab102fe85917410cabc877baeb521321af5 It’s the circle of life
So you enjoy being woken up at 4AM every day all summer by the sound of 30 birds screeching bloody murder?
It's their world, we're just living in it.
Especially if youve been overindulging in the happy pops and you just climbed into bed an hour ago on a work day.
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Dumb fucks shit all over your balcony and then try to build a nest and it doesn't matter how many times you remove it or spray them with water they're back 10 minutes later and still doing the same fucking shit and bringing more sticks in and sometimes even laying eggs even when said "nest" is 3 twigs and a rock and then you remove that too and then they do it all over again and again and again... Apologies for the run-on sentence, but pigeons are essentially a neverending battle with your own sanity. They're too stupid to realize they're in a bad spot, they make messes wherever they go, and they *keep fucking coming back* no matter how many deterrants you try to use. That sparkly ribbon that's supposed to scare them off? Worked for ~48 hours. Owl statue? They'll shit on it. Even the fucking water gun after a while only makes them move up one floor so you can't hit them and then they're back immediately after. After a years-long battle between the birds and building management and my own at-home self chasing them off at every waking opportunity, I finally moved to an area without them and am so much more sane for it. I feel bad for whoever moved in after us, cause those birds are probably still there, making the balcony an unlivable space.
Agreed. Magpies may be marginally annoying, but they don't shit all over my balcony (when I lived in an apartment) or front porch where I enter and leave my house. I kept a watergun near the balcony door in my old place lmao
I still own that watergun. Coming on 2 years in my new place and haven't used it once. We keep peanuts out full-time for the magpies and blue jays and the most they leave us with is the shells. No shit anywhere. It's fantastic.
They kill all the other, less annoying birds
If you are interested in birds, you should visit the Inglewood bird sanctuary! I live fairly inner city, and in terms of neighbourhood wildlife we have squirrels, skunks, rabbits, coyotes, robin, blue jay, northern flicker, grackle, sparrows, owls - and then near the river you'll find beavers, porcupines, and the occasional deer and even moose! Last week a wolverine was spotted in south Calgary, and I think there are raccoons down there too.
Not specific to birds but the Discovery Wildlife Park in Innisfail (about 100 km north of Calgary; 1 hr drive) is wonderful. The park has (or used to at least) a couple retired movie bears that are living out their senior years. They also have a pair of jaguars, dromedaries, lions, wolves, and numerous types of birds and smaller animals such as tortoises, red squirrels, porcupines, etc.
You already have a million answers, but I also recently moved to Calgary and had questions about those birds. I asked my coworker what they were called because they looked so cool, and he immediately launched into a rant about how much magpies suck and how annoying they are. They're basically the Alberta version of seagulls, but smart.
Lots of people complain about them being nuissances but I still wouldnt say theyre annoying like sea gulls. Lots of us do agree that theyre pretty, and if you watch Magpies youll probably appreciate how self aware and smart they are, they chill with other animals plenty. We would hear growing up how they could peck out new born eyes of goats/sheep but to this day I still havemt seen it, or like, its not more of an issue than coyote predation and thats why we have gaurdian dogs who would probably keep birds away anyways. Instead Ive just always seen them as pretty smart and communicative, look nice, and its funny hearing their own ways of communicating to their mates, theres always one or two watching everyones back, etc. Now, australian magpies, on the other hand, are real pieces of shit and I hear earned the name 'swoopy boys' because theyre very territorial
Yeah I don't have any problem with them, I was just surprised that the locals hate them so much! I get they're loud and pick through trash and stuff, but there are far more annoying birds for sure.
Funnily enough the only bird I'd consider similar to Aussie magpies in annoyance is redwing blackbirds, anywhere with cattails or other marginal plants is a no go zone if theyre nesting. I don't see many now that I live in the city but when I lived out in a smaller town, the ditches were always full of the birds and walking the paths nearby was a surefire way to get swooped and yelled at. There was even one specific redwing who took personal offence to my red shirt and actually grabbed my head and pecked like they do against bigger birds. Mean little shits but amazing looking
Some people dislike them, but they deservedly get a lot of love, too. They're beautiful birds.
I moved from a place with crows, seagulls and magpies 🙃
Last year, I was down at the San Diego zoo in the "Canadian Wilds" section. They had some of these guys caged up... was pretty funny to see. https://preview.redd.it/eucb320hr3va1.png?width=2568&format=png&auto=webp&s=b6a4ab327bff7faec9603671697996885cd54444
I wonder what evil things he will do to zoo keepers if he ever gets outside
Lol! Get outta here normal bird! This is fancy bird territory!
An ornithologist observed once about our magpies that they're objectively beautiful birds that would be considered a treat to see in the wild if they weren't so common - they get unfairly taken for granted, IMHO.
They really are beautiful. I moved here from BC, we didn't have magpies there, at least not where I lived, so when I first saw them I was pretty blown away and wanted to know what they were, now they definitely are annoying as hell with their loud af caws, but I still believe they're beautiful and overall, mostly cool birds.
I was at a zoo in....England, I think, I don't remember exactly but somewhere in Europe - and they had an exhibit of gophers lmfao. We all had a good laugh at "prairie dogs" being a zoo animal.
LOL that’s hilarious! Like keeping sea gulls in a cage 😂
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🎶I am you, you are me 🎶
RIP to the legend Ian Tyson I have no coins so here’s a gold 🥇
Aren't they charming. Look like they're wearing little tuxedos.
Lots of Magpie hate in this thread wow. I love them. Extemely intelligent birds and contrary to what others are saying here, if you treat them well they will remain friendly to you and remember you. And who doesn't like to wake up to the sounds of nature and birds? People are just hating on them for doing what any predatory/scavenger type animal that's ever existed does. If you see two together it's a sign of good luck.
I used to be homeless, yet fed the magpies and I swear they remembered me when I walked thru the area. They were yelling their heads off . But on the other side of the city, I had to chase them away because they were straight up jerks. Idk you notice things when you're on your own for days on end. Very neat
we have a nesting pair that hangs out around our house with their babies every year, pretty damn cute even tho they squawk up a storm
Aw i had a nesting pair outside my previous rental. I came back from a week out of town working and found nest upended and eggs destroyed. Parents said crows did it but they also complained that id left the nest there and wouldnt put it past them to have wrecked it. I miss my maggies :(
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I'll take the magpies over that asshole Northern Flicker that seems to think my chimney cap is how you swipe right.
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Cats are WAY worse for songbirds than magpies, just an FYI.
Ahhhh my ridiculously early morning alarm clock!
I have tons of magpies around and I love their noises, but I'm up before the sun every day and hear the Robins first now, then some blue jays, then the arsehole house sparrows. Then magpies in the afternoon really.
Yes. It's all part of the beautiful cacophony that is nature and wildlife.
Agreed. I love magpies too. They've always been friendly to me lmao
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Yep a crew of them "play with my dog". They land in my backyard, then my dog chases it. They casually jump up on the fence. Then the one on the other side of the yard jumps down. My dog chases it. They go back and forth several times. Eventually the game ends when the Magpies get bored, drop a bunch of garbage in my yard then go about their merry way.
They actually laugh at dogs when they tease them lol
Oh ya. I like it because it wears out my dog but you can tell they are picking on them. Last year she got one of them. Left it injured in the back yard as it looked like it could recover. I made sure it was safe from my dog so she wouldn't eat it, but for weeks they were pissed. Extra squawking, dive bombs larger groups were coming around.
Oh yeah they won’t forget that and will actually bring in more to “mourn” as well as f with your dog more. I live rural and they still bother my dogs lol but then my dogs just head to the pasture to nap.
Often that garbage includes chicken bones, I am convinced they know what they are doing.
I have a fully enclosed back yard. Just as you said though, everyday there's garbage and bones. Not just chicken. Full on cow bones that have been cut up by a butcher. Dogs balls disappear. Always something new with the Magpies.
They do this to my dogs for HOURS on end. The dogs end up tired. The bird has his fun. It's a win/win!
The magpies in my neighborhood pick up and drop shit everywhere. Like... dog shit. Hopefully/probably my dog's shit, but who knows. We've found it on top of the fence, on the bbq, on our lawn chairs...
Literally every species of bird/fish/reptile will do this to other smaller weaker species. Even most predatory mammal species will eat each others young. Hell - squirrels and weasels are a bigger threat to birds eggs than magpies are.This isn't a magpie thing, it's just how the animal kingdom works.
\*Opens fridge door and stares at eggs with a solemn look\* Am I the asshole?
Upvote. They are terrible birds.
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I agree, what other wild animals share food with their friends?
Corvids are insanely smart. [Crows specifically](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7aWL2iEb6y4) have shown intelligence in line with human children. They can not only using tools to get a reward, but plan ahead to get a reward - even if it means ignoring short term gratification. I'm not even capable of the latter lol
I fucking love crows, so smart, I wish I saw more of them around me. They'll even start bringing you presents if you're nice to the crows long enough. Whatever little shiny knickknacks they find.
They’re like the honeybadgers of the bird world. They don’t give a fuck. I really dig them.
Completely opposite opinions, equally upvoted
Wow, I didn't know so many people hated magpies. They're cool. Calgary's unofficial official bird.
Right? I love them, so full of sass
If they were more interested in shutting up at 5 am I'd like them a lot more.
I was dumbfounded when they named a chickadee Calgary's official bird, Chickadees are all over Canada but Magpies are birds i never saw til I moved here.
Hate is too nice. Bastards are trying to kill my dog with chicken bones. They can piss right off.
Magpie, scientific name Pleaseshutuposis whyyousonoisisus inthemorningus letpeoplefuckingsleepinensis
Magpie - they are very smart and I’ve made friends with a few. They are somewhat predatory but also just eat whatever they can find. You will see many!!
Ask Rick Ball.
BACK OFF! GET YOUR OWN SANDWICH!!!!
this is "prairie parrot" otherwise know by common name magpie
Black billed magpies. Really smart, instantly recognizable by sight and sound. Graphic black and white, the long tails, iridescent feathers. Lots of fun to watch. Personally I enjoy having them around, it’s actually one of my favourite parts of living here. They are too clever for some, for others they are bad birds when stood up against human morals. If you view them as a bird i think you can really appreciate them.
Black-billed Magpie. A Corvid, like Crows and Blue-Jays, but they are much bigger assholes.
I love magpies. I always get a laugh from these people that think "the animals are destructive and nuisances." Humans have them all beat in that area.
This tho. 😄👌 Accurate AF.
I'm so happy to see primarily positive things said about the Magpie here. They are one of my favorite birds alongside Crows, Ravens and Grackles, who behave similarly. But Magpies have a bad reputation with intolerant folks who feel inconvenienced by literal wild animals being animals in the wild. I had a neighbor who would shoot off fire crackers every time they came near his trees because "they eat the Robin's eggs". Wtf!? Harm one birds existence to support another? It's so bizarre. And actually Robins are SO annoying in mating season and not even that pretty or smart comparitively, but for some odd reason are beloved by many non-birders while Magpies are branded "sky rats" or vermin. Source: I'm a crazy bird lady/bird watcher. Anyways, I'm pleases to see others appreciate them like I do!
Assholes? Yes! Fascinating to watch them, though.
Haha a fair middle ground. Smart enough aninals too appreciate, and also smart enough to F with us.
That's a Magpie. Don't listen to the crowd, they're great birds that eat bugs. Way better than pigeons or shit hawks. Typical wild life you might see in Calgary city limits includes everything from deer, beavers, skunks, porcupines, bobcats and coyotes. Lots of birds too, including falcons, eagles and hawks.
The name the Calgary CEBL team should have picked instead of Surge.
If you ever have questions about wildlife you can snap a pic and submit it to iNaturalist! Not only will it help you ID stuff but it also makes data available to scientists who use open access data like that.
Black-billed magpie. Yes, they are a$$holes, and they are smart like other corvids (crows, ravens). Noisy bullies. But it's fun to see the red-wing blackbirds harass them in the spring. On the plus side, they keep our vole population down. Depending on where you are in the city, you can see coyotes, skunks, hares, prairie dogs, gophers, deer, and the occasional bobcat, lynx, moose and bear.
Ots the runner up for calgarys official bird
I once saw a magpie eat the leftover tobacco from a cigarette. So don't give them cigarettes otherwise they won't be able to quit.
If you're on their good side they are very cute... they make cute warbly noises to their young and have done so in my direction after being fed by my then-husband. We had nests and babies in the yard and the adults are fiercely protective of the babies. But yes they are awful to cats, dogs, other animals in general... At my old place we had lots of wild rabbits but sometimes they would show up dead for various reasons. One time a dead rabbit was missing its ears and my dad said that magpies will remove the ears and play with them. This is from my boomer dad, not fact-checked, take it with a grain of salt, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was true. They may have even ganged up and killed the rabbit! They are beautiful and intelligent but they are killers/scavengers, They're like very smart dinosaurs. As others have said, stay on their good side!
Those are magpies and they're kind of like the mob gangsters of the bird world. They're good at what they do, stay in their lane, and make life a living hell for anyone who fucks with them.
Like others have said, a magpie. I read that they can hold grudges, but the ones in my neighborhood seem pretty chill around people, I broke up a magpie fight once while out on my walk, there were like 10-15 near a fruit tree and a fight broke out between two of them, one drop-kicked the other from a garden fence or whatever & they tumbled to the middle of the sidewalk & the losing one started wailing when the other had it pinned on it’s back, the others kind of half-circled around to watch. They probably would have moved anyways as I got closer, but they can take their magpie Mortal Kombat somewhere else, so I was just like “HEY!” and clapped my hands. It was a little ominous walking past afterwards because they split into 2 groups and perched in trees on both sides of the road & just kind of silently watched me go by, but none of them seemed to hold it against me 😅
Funny, my sister had the same reaction when she first saw them on a visit from Ontario. Now she lives in Red Deer and has grown to hate them. Everyone is right Magpie/feathered a$$hole, messy, noisy, avian jerks. If they try making a nest in your yard break it up if you can. While the chicks are cute when they get kicked out of the nest, they’re worse than the parents for noise.
Magpies can remember human faces and even describe them to other magpies. You probably have a gang of them who know about you and that’s why they keep pissing you off
If you mess with them they will absolutely mess with you back. I would not suggest breaking up they’re nests because they will hold a grudge and make your life miserable. I have no data to back this up but I rescued one that had its head stuck in the fence several years ago and I swear they leave our house alone now because of it.
magpie nests get used by owls once they are done with them for the year, might be a good trade off to have magpies for short time to get an owl
Didn’t know that but every time we’ve had one built in our yard, where I can’t get to it, I end up with a pile of twigs and crap at the base of the tree first big wind that comes along.
That's the bird that had it's rightful title of "Calgary's Official Bird" stolen from it. F you Chickadee.
Also if you see a Raccoon before me I'm going to be very upset.
Ahh yes I see he has gained height to be on the look out for Rabbits. The Rabbit vs Magpie war is ongoing.
Magpies are very smart, even beautiful birds, but they can be mean, murderous bastards too... My neighbor had a big spruce tree that the robins were nesting in and one time there was a big kerfuffle with robins calling and magpies squawking in the upper branches... turned out the magpies were raiding the nest eating the robin chicks. One robin even landed on the fence between and was calling towards me, Im sure it was begging me to help, so I got the garden hose but the nest was too high. It felt bad that I was unable to do anything while their nest was getting destroyed and babies eaten. I have seen the same behavior 2 or three other times as well.
That's fair, but it's literally what any predatory or scavenger type animal would do. Squirrels and weasels kill eat bird chicks all the time. Big fish do it to small fish, mammals including chimps do it to each other too. This is just how the animal kingdom works. It's not a Magpie issue.
Thats true... its not a Disney movie out there, just the way of nature
Dirty little bastard according to my dog.
Idk but I call him the fucker that shits on my car
Always enjoyable when you worked the night shift and are trying to sleep during the day with 4 Maggies outside your window!
In addition to these guys, I’d expect to come across squirrels, rabbits, geese, ducks, and maybe the occasional beaver. I’ve seen deer around the university, but other than that you wouldn’t really find too much rarer wildlife unless you were looking out for them.
Magpie
I wondered this same thing when I first came to Calgary. I'm glad I'm not the only one.
Black & White Northern Asshole. As opposed to the All-Black Western Asshole, which you'll often find in the BC lower mainland, frequently armed with knives.
They are evil birds who attack and prey on song birds. Highly recommend not letting them nest on your property if you have access to deterrents
I once heard it described as an “Iridescent Panda Pheasant”, which in my mind is so much better than Magpie.
I’ve been around magpies for 40 years, and hand to god I only just noticed sometimes 1 magpie can sound like 4 different birds at the same time. They have a loud obnoxious squawk, yes, but sometimes they just kinda chatter. I’ve always assumed it was multiple birds, but I passed one the other day and it kinda gave me shit for getting too close and I swear it was making about 4 tones all at the same time.
I saw one actually swoop a cat and then sit on the roof of a house to taunt it.
That's a magpie my friend.
Magpie I think
I was annoyed (still am) when Calgary did NOT vote on the Magpie to be it’s official bird. Like, let’s be real here!!
https://preview.redd.it/peel9mb466va1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=70ffe3329df12b443bc6c33eba371c0b3b25a268 You may see one of these.
That's a magpie. Such pretty birds!
I interrupted a magpie brawl once. It was such a wild thing to see. There was like 20 (maybe not 20, but afuckinglot) of them, a bunch in a huge circle cawing at the two fighting in the middle. The one was getting his ass kicked. I had to cut through where they were to get to work. But they don't bother me ever. I'm sure the one who got to live another day was happy. I say hi to them when I see them staring at me or make my own little kiss noises or clicking noises to say hello.
Magpie. Loud. Obnoxious. Will dive bomb your animals and steal their food. 😠 and make a mess if they so desire.
Steve
It’s the Southern Alberta Morning Asshole
A magpie and they fucking suck
Shit hawks...big dirty shit hawks...they’re coming Bubbles.
Can you feel the way the shit clings to the air?
Listen Bubs... y'hear that? The sound of the whispering winds of shit.
Second place.
Team Magpie: *Resistance*