Twice this week, I've had people who love birds condemn magpies as the devil's spawn. Their hatred for these birds couldn't be any stronger. Yet, they are magnificent birds. When you look at them up close their plumage is a brilliant, pure white and the black takes on a sheen of metallic green, like oil on water. They look so smooth, sleek and clean you want to touch them, stroke them and feel their their firm, muscular bodies.
Yes, they do eat garden birds and kill chicks in nests. So do a number of other birds and animals that don't get tarred with the same brush. This is nature. A research project looking into predation by magpies in Paris has recently been published and it concludes that while magpies do kill other birds, they are not responsible for the decline of any songbird species.
Magpies are a convenient scapegoat. Their numbers have increased as songbirds have decreased. But magpie numbers were at an all time low as a result of persecution and changes in land management. What we are seeing is a return to traditional magpie numbers coinciding with a shift of their range into our gardens. Let's not rush to blame and condemn. Let's celebrate these unique long tailed natives.
We have a long association with the magpie, they have been immortalised in folklore and verse. Almost every child knows the rhyme: 'One for sorrow. Two for joy." There are all sorts of superstitions requiring you to bow or spit to ward off evil if you see a magpie. Yet, farmers liked magpies because they would help protect crops from pests by eating insects and rodents.
Magpies build superb domed nests and are the UK's biggest bird to do so. I think their problem is the way they walk and look. They seem somehow arrogant and aloof. Characteristics that we, generally, don't like. We can all imagine them acting out Daphne du Maurier's short story, The Birds, made into an effective horror movie by Alfred Hitchcock. Magpies are self-aware too. They are able to recognise themselves in a mirror. How smart is that?
Let's call an amnesty and welcome this two-toned member of the crow family into our lives. We don't condemn lions or cheetahs for being meat eaters, and we ourselves slaughter millions of animals to eat every year. The magpie is a splendid and clever wild bird that deserves as much respect as you'd give a blackbird, a hedgehog or an ancient oak tree. If you really want to help you garden birds, don't scapegoat magpies. Sign-up for our Homes for Wildlife project and use you garden to support more wildlife.
I too like magpies. They are cheeky birds. We used to have them in our garden but the seagulls took over and chased them out. Suddenly a few weeks ago after several years of nuisance the seagulls have disappeared and guess what those cheeky magpies have returned and have started picking garden ornaments up and rearranging them for us.