The Cowbird Parable and How We View Others

Cowbirds are considered brood parasites and pests. But are they all bad? Do they have no redeeming qualities? What can we learn from them about how we view any of God’s creatures – human, plant or animal?

The other day I posted a photo of some cowbirds. In doing research on them I learned that a lot of people hate them and feel like they are vermin because they don’t build their own nests. The females are considered “lazy” for laying their eggs in other birds’ nests and letting them raise their young. Cowbirds commonly lay their eggs in sparrows, red-winged birds, song sparrows, and spotted towhees nests.

The female cowbird might toss some eggs out of the sparrow or red-winged blackbird’s nest to make room for its own. Because cowbird eggs hatch faster, their babies sometimes kick other eggs out of the nest or gobble up the food. Bigger birds recognize cowbird eggs and toss them out of the nest before they hatch. But little birds aren’t big enough to remove them. Many times young cowbirds just blend in with other blackbirds and are reared alongside them.

By autumn, young cowbirds find other cowbirds. They live in big flocks with their own kind and with other blackbirds.

Why God Created Cowbirds

Here’s what most people don’t realize. Cow birds follow cattle, bison and Buffalo around, eating the bugs that gather around their excrement and the cattle themselves. This keeps diseases from forming in the cattle and making humans sick as well. About 90% of a cowbird’s diet consists of ticks. They also eat flies, ants, mealworms, spiders, and some worms. Unfortunately, they don’t eat Japanese beetles. I sure wish they did! I’ll keep them around for the ticks, though!

Cowbirds play a vital role in the clean up crew of nature. As bison, buffalo and cattle roam around the plains, these birds tag along and clean up after them. This nomadic lifestyle is hardly conducive for nesting and caring for young. Most other birds stay within about a mile radius of their nests. Cowbirds can’t do that.

So nature has a way to help the cowbirds survive. Some of their eggs make it and some don’t. There is a price being paid by some birds, but there is also a great service being performed by these birds for nature as a whole — especially if they live in locations where they can do what they were born to do and fulfill their divine purpose.

Dealing with Misplaced Cowbirds

If you want to get rid of cowbirds from your suburban area, you can’t kill them because they are protected under the migratory bird treaty. But you can do something …. Don’t feed them. There are bird seeds and nuts that other birds like that cowbirds don’t. Cowbirds don’t like suet, safflower or whole peanuts. They are very attracted to tomatoes, lettuce, peppers, sweet corn, grains, and sunflower seeds. If you want them to go away, use small non platform feeders or tube feeders with things they don’t eat.

If you garden, you could either not grow the plants they like (hard to do if you like growing tomatoes like we do). Or I guess you could plant so many there’s enough for you and the birds. I’m wondering now if the cowbirds were what ate chunks out of our tomatoes last year. I’ll be covering them with bird netting this year.

Pro Shield Pest has a good article on managing cowbirds here. It’s a source for my research.

The Cowbird Parable

When I learned about the upsides to cowbirds, I realized that like all of us, they aren’t all bad or all good. Everything and everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. As I pondered and prayed about the meaning of cowbirds, I thought of how some look at groups of people and perceive them as “invasive” or coming in and taking jobs or resources from citizens.

These “invasive” people are willing to do tasks and dirty jobs that most Americans aren’t willing to do. For example, fewer Americans are willing to work in food services… even with a $3k signing bonus and $15-$20 per hour pay. For many years most Americans haven’t been willing to work on ranches and farms, etc.

And NO, I am not saying all immigrants need to work on ranches or McDonalds. I’m saying these people each have an individual purpose! What if we fostered their divine purpose and invited their gifts to the table, instead of having a scarcity mentality? Scarcity assumes that people are taking something away from us by existing in our space.

What if these immigrants serve a purpose in the grand scheme of things? What if they’re bringing something valuable to the table? And aren’t they God’s creations? God loves and created cowbirds. He most certainly loves these people!

We can’t judge the cowbird for showing up where there’s food. How can we judge people for showing up where there is opportunity for a decent life? Maybe the solution is to see the good people bring and stop incentivizing certain behavior or migratory patterns. There is lots of unhealthy behavior that gets incentivized in the United States among citizens and non citizens alike. Perhaps it’s time we stopped incentivizing certain behavior across the board.

What if there is something of equal value these new people can give that offsets their presence in our country? Are we giving them the opportunity to give? Or are we enabling them not to step into their divine purpose with policies that are like platform feeders attracting cowbirds? Think about it, America was built by hard-working immigrants. Are today’s immigrants being expected to work like early ones were? Perhaps it’s the welfare policies, not the people that are the root problem?

If it’s criminal behavior that concerns you (like the cowbird female tossing a Towhee’s eggs from the nest to make room for her own) perhaps it’s a lack of equal application of the rule of law, that is the problem. With consistent, just, and fair laws applied with consistent consequences for law-breaking, people learn how to behave.

Obviously, people aren’t birds, so nothing is as simple as a bird analogy. But, I still think there is something we can learn about looking for the good here that could soften judgement and bring more compassion and understanding. We could also learn something about the nature of any animal or human when misplaced and seduced away from their divine purpose.

Take from the Cowbird Parable what you will, but bottom line, when someone becomes angry at a large segment of the animal or human population, clumping them into categories, I hope you’ll think of the cowbird. I hope you’ll consider that the targets of derision may have strengths and gifts to bring to the table. I hope you’ll also remember that people are individuals, not groups, with one mass personality. There can be varying degrees of good and evil in any one of us.

Staying Aligned with your God-Given Purpose

I think the cowbird can also teach us about how valuable each of us are when we’re living our divine purpose. The cowbird with no cows to follow can also teach us how annoying or damaging we can be when we are not living in harmony with our God-given purpose. There is so much meaning and wisdom to unpack from the Cowbird Parable! How will you apply it in your personal life?

Connect with your Divine Purpose (or what I call your Soul’s Song) by downloading this free Soul’s Song Attunement: