By Nancy Cowing Umphres

Early last spring during busy baby bird season, I received a call from a local woman who had just found a nestling in her front yard. The bird had taken a very long tumble from an extremely tall palm tree. She thought the rather homely baby might be a woodpecker, as she had seen several adult birds in the area. I gave her directions to the rescue center and rushed to thaw some crickets and prepare a hospital cage for the new addition.
The bird arrived in a cardboard box which the woman had carefully lined with tissue. I gazed into the box at a very indignant looking little gargoyle who proceeded to tell me exactly what he thought of his situation. As I examined him, he used his long, sharp beak to emphasize his displeasure.
I knew he wasn't a woodpecker as I have raised many over the years and this fellow was very different in his appearance. He still had tufts of long, grayish down but was beginning to get some brown juvenile plumage. His long brown beak was the real giveaway and I felt that rush of excitement that comes when I receive species I have never rescued before. He was my first European starling.
My excitement over a simple starling probably seems insane to most of my fellow wildlife rehabilitators. Most areas of the US are inundated with this very prolific species, but they are fairly rare in the Zapata area. It's probably too hot for their European blood, and only brave few individuals end up here.
The European starling was introduced into the United States in the 1890s by a Shakespearean enthusiast named Eugene Schieffein. He and a few others were determined to introduce all the animals in the works of William Shakespeare into the United States. The starling took quite well to its new home and gradually multiplied from the original one hundred or so birds to the hundreds of millions in our present time. The European starling is still considered a non-native bird.
I first read about starlings in the book King Solomon's Ring by the naturalist Konrad Z. Lorenz. I was in my early teens and was intrigued by his description of this personable species. It only took 34 years to get the chance to actually raise one, and I certainly wasn't disappointed.
Stanley, as he became known to me, lost his nestling down and soon grew into his rather drab brown juvenile plumage. What he lacked for in color he made up for in intelligence and personality. The starling is related to the Myna bird and has the same ability to mimic as well as a repertoire of his own wide range of calls. Some mimic other birds as well as human speech. There are several interesting Internet sites with the recorded sounds of captive held starlings. The European starling is not a protected species so in many states you are allowed to keep them as pets.
Stanley was soon old enough to move to the songbird aviary, but I was concerned about his cage mates. Stanley was a bit more aggressive than most young birds and he would soon share a cage with a young scissor-tailed flycatcher, a purple Martin, and a white-winged dove. They were all about the same age, so I gave it a try. After the initial introduction I continued to observe the interaction with the four. To my surprise they all got along very well and even slept together in a nest box which I had placed in the aviary. They all crunched in together at dusk with the white wing usually under the purple Martin.
Stanley was the last of the four to finally fledge. He spent a lot of his time in intense examination of all the interesting things he found on his days out of the cage, but he kept returning every evening demanding to be fed and put to bed. During the day he would search me out and attack the top of my head like a woodpecker drilling a hole in wood, his subtle way of telling me that he was hungry. Young starlings are dependent on both parent birds for quite a long time after leaving the nest. Stanley was no exception.
His nights in the aviary soon came to an end and the head attacks became sporadic. Stanley's drab brown feathers were now speckled with white. Days and sometimes weeks would go by without a sighting, and I would worry. Then I would feel the relief of hearing his familiar song.
Months went by before the next sighting and I worried about Stanley and missed his serenades and his visits. It was early this spring that my mother and I took a walk several blocks from the rescue center when I heard him. His song stopped me in mid-sentence as I looked in the direction of his voice. There he sat on the power line singing his heart out. I called back to him and he proceeded to follow us and tell us all about his life. At least it seemed that way to us.
I felt a deep sadness as we walked along and listened to his song. He was still alone. I had not seen any of his kind in our area. Suddenly his cheeps and twitters intensified as he kept flying off and returning. I finally spotted the object of his excitement. Further down the electric lines sat another starling to whom Stanley flew and then rushed back enthusiastically as though to tell us, "Look! I have found my own kind and I am very happy!"

(The Zapata Wildlife Rescue Center can be contacted by mail at 6812 STOP 68A, Zapata, TX 78076-2913, by phone at (956) 765-8526, or e-mail at dreams@zapata.border.net. Those interested in visiting should call ahead for directions.)