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Journalism of Courage
This is a stressful time of the year for crows. Fast asleep on their perches, they are roused well before dawn by that ringing mocking call, “keeeo-keeeo-keeeo” rising to a hysterical crescendo. Already, black mischief is afoot. The koels are up and up to no good. The crows know it: they’re going to get diddled, and shamefully, they fall for the same ruse year after year. Frankly, any bird that gets the better of those street-smart hellions deserves respect. (While wooing their ladies, gentlemen koels sing sweeter, but not less neurotically, “kuoo-kuoo-kuoo”) And before we get too smug and start to titter — we’ve been made fools of by koels too. So many doting parents have fondly named their little girls Koel (because it rolls off the tongue silkily and its song is so mellifluous) without realising that the singer is the slinky, Satan-black, effeminate cock bird, and not the lady. And the loony call is usually given just before he (and his partner) are about to pull one royally over those strutting corvids.
What usually happens is this: the koels have spotted and earmarked a suitable crow’s nest, where the arrival of a family is being awaited. The gentleman koel darts around it calling mockingly, causing a great flutter in the crows’ residence that raises blood pressure in the family. Both crow parents give chase, cawing angrily, while the koel slinks and swerves between the trees, like a biker calling away. His missus, artfully camouflaged in barred bark-brown, slips into the unattended nest and deposits the results of her rollicking dalliances with her partner. Her eggs are much the same colour (greeny-grey splotched rusty) as the crows’ eggs, if a little smaller and she does not, (like some of her relatives) chuck out her hostess’ eggs. She doesn’t need to: Her babies hatch before the crow babies, and monopolise all food deliveries, starving out their crow step-siblings. The subterfuge goes one step further. The koel babies are dark and sooty, like crow babies, including the little girls, who, once they are relatively independent, will begin to look like their moms — barred and dappled brown and white. They call hoarsely like crow babies too, until of course, their voices change — causing great consternation to their doting crow parents and to themselves too.
Imagine the scene (with suitable background music) if you will:
Crow mama and papa: Caw-caw, baby, have you got a sore throat? What’s happened to your voice?
Baby crow/koel: I’m fine, leave me alone. Can I have some privacy please? Caw-kuoo-caw-kuoo!
Crow parents: What did you just say?
Baby crow/koel: Who me?
Cakuoo-kuooo.
Mama crow: Hai bacche, you are not one of us! Dhoka ho gaya (We have been conned)! Izzat ka faluda ho gaya!
Papa crow: Haram sala ulloo da pattha (you misbegotten offspring of an owl, be gone!) Aside: He may be forgiven for mixing up species here.
Mama crow (in tears and beating her breast with her wings): Itne pyaar se paala, khilaya-pilaya — we raised you with such love, fed you and looked after you! For this? Hai-hai!
Papa crow: Go! Never darken our doorstep again!
Baby koel: Mama! Papa! I love you! My own parents don’t want me! Boo-hoo kuoo-kuoo-kuoooo! Nobody loves me! Nobody wants me! Who am I?
Devil (to Baby Koel): Heh-heh! What are you crying for, beti? You can live life the way you want to and not worry about consequences. If anything happens, there are so many loving crow families who will willingly opt for adoption. Go, enjoy life!
Baby koel (cheering up quickly): Shukriya swamiji , you have shown me the way! I have to seek my own identity and destiny! I must find myself!
It is believed that the baby koels’ mom keeps hovering around her babies’ adopted home, ostensibly to check that they’re being brought up with proper values and even brings them tidbits as treats when they leave the nest. Also, it seems that some crows make exemplary parents: Salim Ali wrote of a crow’s nest that contained 11 koel eggs, deposited by different koel moms — so those crows were obviously into parenting big time, or exceptionally stupid, or wanting to audition for Sound of Music 2.
Gentlemen koels have loud belligerent screaming matches with each other in order to prove who is the better man. Two gents once perched outside my window, yelling their heads off, with the lady sitting nervously between them. One started off hurling insults at 100 decibels, his crimson eyes bulging, shiny patent leather plumage glinting bronze green. Suddenly, he shut up, and immediately the other started off trying to out-shout him. The poor lady got so nervous she fled to a nearby tree, where another slinky fellow was waiting for just this to happen.
Lady koels don’t seem to have a very good sense of direction — or eyesight — because, at least three times, they have banged headfirst into glass windows and fallen dazed to the ground, beaks agape. Each time, they eventually recovered and flew off but gave me a good opportunity to examine their lovely stippled plumage close up (Their eyes are red and psychotically lunatic).
They eat fruit, berries, insects and other slimy creepy-crawlies, as well as eggs of small birds and are found throughout the subcontinent. Summer and the monsoon is their prime-time and in the winter they’re quiet and retiring — maybe depressed while reflecting on and regretting their wild and wanton ways and promising to change.
Nah, never! Who would want to do a stupid thing like that?
Ranjit Lal is an author, environmentalist and birdwatcher
