The Yellow-Billed Magpie

The only other time I ever saw a bird like this one, albeit without the blue bits on the wing, I saw it in a London park, and I knew it was a magpie. Why? Because magpies are as thick on the ground there as mourning doves are here. It was just something I knew.  Maybe it's in my genes or something.

But until today, I had no idea that magpies lived in the U.S. -- well, except for the human variety, which Pop, my father in law,  can tell you all about.  

When I saw a bird like this today, just starting out on the trail up Mission Peak, I couldn't figure out what it was. Hmmm, I thought, it's about the size of a crow, black and white with deep sapphire blue patches on its wings. It kinda looks like a magpie, but . . . .

I grabbed my little East Bay Parks bird guide.  Nope, no pictures like that, no magpies.

I grabbed the new girly white iPhone with the pink antenna-protector thingy and tried to snap photos of the bird on the way up. No luck. I tried to look it up on the girly iPhone, too, but that was wasting too much good time.  I just relaxed and enjoyed the hike.

And then coming back down, my husband pointed this bird out, sitting on the barbed wire fence.  He/she (the bird) wasn't a bit worried about me; in fact, it was so busily chattering away that I almost felt it was inviting me to talk -- or trying to scare me away from its nest.I sidled my way closer than I'd thought I could and snapped a few photos.

It still reminded me of a magpie, and my husband pointed out its yellow bill and the bits of yellow around its eyes. 

Back home, neither of the other SF area bird books had a photo of this bird, so I turned to my big red field guide, The National Audubon Society Western Field Guide, which I bought recently at Borders' bankruptcy blowout.

I followed my hunch, looked up "magpie," and found it.  A magpie with a yellow bill, all right! 

A yellow-billed magpie. Whaddaya know?  Sometimes things just do make sense.

Up on that trail, I stood looking at that bird and also looking down at a campus where I'd taught English, oh, 15 years ago.  Back then, I would never have hiked, unless it was to Starbucks, and I also bet that had that bird plopped itself right in front of me on the sidewalk as I rushed into or out of the classroom, I'd have missed it.

Not any longer, and I am so grateful that I see differently now.