In a few books I've read over the past years, I have come across references to an Englishwoman who opened up her house to birds. She sounded like a complete eccentric in one text and in another like an absolute iconoclast, ahead of her time and blazing a trail.
The woman is Gwendolen (Len) Howard. There is a short BBC film of her in 1961 - and in this she does appear as distinctly odd. She talks about how chased away a very possessive robin, but also about how only some people could have such a close relationship as she does with birds. This article describes her life with the birds - and I can't see the point of typing it myself, so read that and then come back to this. OK?
I am reading her first book, Birds as Individuals. It seems to be out of print and wasn't cheap. The second one, also out of print, it seems, was even more expensive. If this had been a book by a man about, I don't know, wolves or eagles, it would be a classic. Actually, Konrad Lorenz wrote about geese and jackdaws and his work is celebrated. But tits?? And by a woman? Not a trained zoologist? Who genuinely loves the birds? It must be bunkum.
But it's not. There is so much in these books. For example, ant bathing. Scientists used to think that formic acid acted as a pesticide, then they decided it didn't and have no idea why birds like ants to crawl on them. Len did. Ants eat lice larvae. It's the ants themselves who perform a cleaning role.
She also gave a me a term for the 'singing under his breath' that I had noted in reference to Son of Bob: she calls it 'subsong'. And it's a thing. I have said that I could tell mood from the sound of emotion in the pace, delivery and frequency of crow caws. As well as recognising individuals. And that fits with everything Len says.
Incidentally, here is SoB singing out loud. With a little encouragement.
She describes various episodes which demonstrate the intelligence of birds - reasoning ability, swift learning, play, memory, problem solving, planning and even precognition. One autumn she had a lot of robins battling for territory in her garden - it was the only time there had been so many and they had been so determined. That winter proved to be particularly bitter. She describes birds rescuing and helping other birds. She talks of a blackbird who would carry an oak leaf whenever he was displaying to defend his territory. Amazing stuff.
As a result - as she reckons that great tits are the cleverest birds - I have been trying to make friends with the juvenile great tit (Grey Crown) in my garden. Slow progress. The adult (Black Crown) is also slightly warming to me. I am not sure either will ever let me this close.
Son of Bob seems to find me intriguing. One morning we just sat together for fifteen minutes. There was food. He ate a bit. He won't take it from my hand. And he caught little grubs of his own as well as eating what I had laid down. But mostly he just perched, tucking his right foot into his feathers. And we hung about there. Regarding each other.
One thing that was funny. I offered food on my hand. He flew away. Then he flew to the pot where I always put food but had not yet done so and pecked at the soil and groomed himself and looked at me. Eventually he decided that I was stupid. He flew to my feet, picked up a small leaf and dropped it in the pot then turned to me expectantly. I dropped the food I was holding into the pot and he ate some. He was, I am sure - it's the sort of thing that Len recounts in her book, telling me what to do.
I accept that Len had a particular affinity for birds. She fed them, provided nest boxes, opened the house to them, but I think that birds are so stressed with the shortage of habitat and food - especially insects - that they are much less able to relax. Len writes about tits having two broods back then, now it seems to be assumed that they only ever have one. I don't know that birds have the luxury to be curious about humans as a rule. They are too damn busy trying to survive.
Whatever the case, Len Howard does for songbirds what Jane Goodall did for chimpanzees, Dian Fossey for gorillas and the less well-known Biruté Galdikas did for orangutans. When Louis Leakey appointed Goodall, she was a lover of wildlife but not a trained scientist. The other two were also naive, intellectual blank slates. That did not deter him. Just maybe he appreciated what Len had done: approaching other animals without being hampered by the restrictive (and irrational) framework of the professional zoologist's reliance on behaviourism.
Great post. Interesting article about Len Howard. Says somewhere she could recognize facial expressions. Glad you have one of her books. Love the videos!