Birds of a Feather

Today is for the birds - real and imagined.

This month was the announcement of the annual Coveted Dead Bird Contest winner (short story of mystery or suspense of ten pages or less) at our local chapter of Sisters in Crime. As usual, we had a fun time with the trophies. 

Far from being standard, the Bird Boss who runs the contest each year is encouraged to be creative in developing the trophy (the winner of last year’s contest was Bird Boss this year). It is all tongue in cheek fun.

*(No birds were harmed in the making of these fake trophies)

This year’s theme was Water Rights and Wrongs and so water played a key role in the trophies as well.

The Baby Bird Award (for a new writer entering our contest for the first time who excels and deserves to be recognized):

And, the major trophy this year, The Coveted Dead Bird? A buzzard—an interesting play on the black bird theme which is our tradition.

It was a fun meeting, but to top it, we had a falconer, Cat Krosschell of the Sierra Foothill Conservancy, come with the real thing - four raptors that she cares for. 

I must say she shared information about raptors that was not only interesting but downright fascinating. The birds were amazing up close.

She brought a peregrine falcon: (we learned that the Air Force has designed a plane based on this bird's wings) They can go 200 miles an hour straight down from a height as high as 10,000 feet. 

And a red-tailed hawk (chicken hawk):

He got a little feisty while his handler was speaking.

And two Great Horned Owls:

A very interesting writer's meeting, with lots of people taking notes so we expect some unusual stories next year for the contest.

What did you do with your Saturday?