Brandon's Blog

Those grackles are annoying birds. When I used to work in downtown Dallas, I noticed problems with the grackles from time to time. They would cause a big mess on the sidewalks and annoy people. Once on Halloween I was crossing the street near Commerce & Griffin and one of them swooped down and got so close to me I could see its eyes (angry looking things). I thought it was going to attack me (as in The Birds), but suddenly took off in another direction. They finally got a crew of guys who walked around clapping their hands and shining some sort of light at the birds. It was funny, but it worked as they eventually left (at least temporarily). I think the hawk system is a better method.

I think the birds seem to be confused these days because of the major weather changes. I have seen other strange things with the birds in the last few years, such as zillions of birds gathered on power lines on a heavily traveled street, other major collections of birds (not grackles) in trees downtown and they are always making a lot of noise. It's just weird.