Delicate egg fragments lie on the path. The colour catches my eye when I am still many steps away and I don’t immediately know what I am seeing. When I realise, I look up, but there are no trees overhead, no nests for little birds to fledge from. A theft then, by another bird or some small climbing mammal. I look up once again, but I don’t think the sky is ever this blue.
Someone told me recently, after I worried about finding parts of blue shells in unexpected and unprotected places, that the parent birds actually take those blue bits and drop them far away from the nest as decoys to keep the newly hatched baby birds safe. You can’t imagine how much better I felt.
And I, too, reading this. It is interesting that I can hardly believe it, can hardly believe there is good news like this to be had, that the scattered blue keeps infant birds safe… but delighted to think of robin’s cleverness, dedication, hope.