On Tuesday, June 28, 2022 we knew. We knew that she was gone. The beautiful little slate-gray creature, who had so unexpectedly flown into our lives two years ago, was now lost to us forever. The previous Friday (June 24th), she was busily gathering nesting materials in preparation for a second clutch of eggs, splashing in her new birdbath, and dropping by to visit us at the patio table for raisins or mealworms. Her less tame mate was helping with the material-gathering, while maintaining his usual behavior of bathing and occasionally perching on a nearby branch to boldly proclaim his territory through his exuberant, bubbly, meandering song.

That fateful Friday night, our dear friend, Bobbie Jo came to visit for cocktails and dinner on the patio. The Catbirds’ visiting and singing continued on, as usual, until the sun went down. The next day, however, we awoke to silence. Eerie, utter silence all day long. We repeatedly called out to our Catbirds with our special whistle, a call that both birds usually responded to, but we were met instead with total silence. We were puzzled, but hopeful that perhaps the sudden absence of both of our dear Catbird friends might indicate her beginning the incubation period of their second clutch of eggs this summer. Although this did not seem to match patterns of nesting behavior over the previous two summers, as even when we suspected she was incubating eggs, she would still stop by for raisins and mealworms every few hours. By the following Tuesday morning, however, after an unprecedented three days of no visits or even sightings of our dear Catbird girl, we just knew that this spelled the ultimate end of a beloved friend and a cherished part of our summer life.

In the meantime, after the complete silence of Saturday, her mate had resumed his singing, but instead of his usual periodic, joyful outbursts of song, he was now singing virtually non-stop, from sunrise until sunset, 14-15 hours a day. He also sounded different–he sounded more frantic, and even a little desperate. We began to worry for his health, as it seemed impossible to imagine how he was getting enough to eat given that he was unable to hunt for food if he was ceaselessly singing, and he also displayed no interest in the plate of raisins. The distressed sound of his endless singing became almost oppressive to us, with its insistent melancholic reminder of our missing Catbird girl, and it soon became evident that he was urgently trying to find another mate. It was a very quiet week for us, as we felt devastated and spent many tearful moments lamenting the loss of our sweet friend while looking for any signs of what might have possibly befallen her. After sharing our concerns with the compassionately kind daughter of our elderly next-door neighbor, she assured us that if she saw any signs of our Catbird, she would be sure to let us know, especially given that she was planning to prune back some of the very rhododendron bushes in which our Catbirds had nested this year (and in which they had also seemed to be constructing their second nest).

A few days later, while on an extended visit with my Mom in Washington County, Pennsylvania, we decided to visit my Dad’s gravesite at Washington Cemetery. Like me, my Dad also had a deep appreciation for birds. So much so, that my Mom decided to have an image of a bird engraved on his grave marker. Although he died in October 2017, a few years before the summer of 2020 when we first befriended our Catbird, I know that he would have greatly enjoyed hearing all about the magical little friendship we shared with her.

As it turned out, just as were were pulling up in the car at my Dad’s gravesite, my phone rang. It was our neighbor’s daughter, calling with the sad news that she had indeed found our Catbird’s body. She reported that although our Catbird had clearly been deceased for a week or so, there did not seem to be any signs of bodily injury to her. Had she struck a window and suffered internal injuries? Did she escape the clutches of a marauding cat, only to later succumb to fatal injury? Did she die of some fast-acting disease or old age? Did she suffer heart failure, as birds sometimes do when subjected to the shock of some sort of stressful threat? We will never know. We still had a several days left in our extended visit with my Mom, so we were not able to be back home in time to sensibly deal with our Catbird’s physical remains, a task for which our neighbor so generously took responsibility. Looking back, I think that it would have been exceedingly painful to see our little Catbird’s lifeless body, so aside from the deep sorrow of knowing for certain that she had indeed died, I also felt a sense of gratitude that I was relieved of that trauma.

Upon our return home to Indiana, PA a few days later, we were saddened yet also gladdened to note the complete absence of our male Catbird. For the first summer in our recollection, the surrounding trees and brush did not ring out with the buoyant, joyful song of a Gray Catbird. While we missed seeing his lovely blue-gray form flitting about and missed his sweet song, we hoped that his absence meant that he had moved on to new territory because he had found a new life with a new mate. A few silent days passed and we began to gradually readjust to a life without our beloved Catbirds. Nonetheless, I still put out raisins and soaked mealworms in the usual places (on the front porch and back patio tables), just in case our Catbird boy returned and needed sustenance.

I also had other reasons for maintaining this practice of leaving out raisins. Earlier in the summer, well before her tragic death, our Catbird had inadvertently “trained” a keenly observant male Robin to also begin visiting us at the patio table for raisins and mealworms. Initially, the Robin became aware of our special Catbird whistle and smartly observed that every time we whistled, the Catbirds were getting food–either by coming to the patio table (female Catbird only) or perching nearby so that we would toss a raisin (male Catbird only). Soon, the male Robin began responding to our whistles and sometimes even chase the male Catbird away to steal a tossed raisin. Also, the male Robin would often sneak in to pilfer a snack when we had briefly left the table. Eventually, however, the male Robin found himself in a predicament that ultimately motivated him to abandon his natural distrust of us–he had two ravenously hungry fledglings to feed! We later read that Robin fathers are often solely responsible for fledged offspring while the mother Robin begins preparing a new nest for the next brood. It was during this intense period of caring for his demanding fledglings that the overwhelmed male Robin overcame his fears and began flying onto the patio table to eat with us and get food for his babies. Sometimes he even brought the babies onto the table with us to get raisins. It was at this time that our summer Catbird Life temporarily went from quiet visits with our Catbird friends to virtual mayhem as our backyard became a chaotic whirlwind of hungry Catbirds and Robins flying in to visit our table for food, with both sets of parents frantically scrambling to satisfy their hungry offspring. Sometimes when we would wake up in the morning, or arrive home from errands, we would be greeted by a swirling fury of Catbirds and Robins impatiently waiting for their food!

It was right around this intense two-week period of Catbird and Robin chaos, that another delightfully unexpected situation began to unfold. A year earlier, during the summer of 2021, we had trained our Catbirds to respond to a specific two-note whistle call to let them know that we were outside and had raisins and/or mealworms ready for them to eat. This special whistle almost always brought one or both Catbirds to us, especially in the mornings when they were extra hungry and impatiently waiting for some treats. Like Mockingbirds, Gray Catbirds are members of the Mimidae family of birds which distinguishes them as belonging to a special group of accomplished mimics. Our male Catbird, like most male songbirds, is a prolific singer and upon careful listening to his complicated, convoluted song, we could detect his sophisticated mimicry of other local birdsong, specifically Robins, House Finches, and Song Sparrows.

One afternoon in late May, weeks before our Catbird girl left this earthly world, I went outside with some raisins. The male Catbird was nearby singing his ebullient bursts of different little melodies, so I whistled out to him to let him know there was food. To my complete surprise, I was met with an immediate echo-whistle back to me. It was a nearly perfect replica of our whistle!!! I whistled again and was immediately met with another echo-back of my whistle! For a brief minute or two, I actually thought that perhaps another person was nearby imitating my whistle–it was that bizarre. It soon became apparent, however, that this was no human, but instead, it was our male Catbird! Within a matter of days, it had also become evident that our male Catbird had indeed incorporated an exact replica of our whistle into his regular song. Even when we did not whistle out to him, we would often hear him, independent of us, punctuating his usual song with an occasional outburst of our whistle. It soon became a regular part of our backyard experience to hear our male Catbird both singing our whistle and also immediately repeating our whistle back to us. Research has shown that as male Catbirds get older, their singing skills become well-honed and their song becomes more enriched and complex. It is theorized that Catbirds may have evolved to mimic other bird songs as a means of demonstrating their advanced life experience, as a more sophisticated and elaborate song might indicate their superior fitness and skill at better protecting and defending their mate and her nest.

So, it was with great joy that by mid-July, after his week-long absence, I heard our male Catbird singing in our yard once again, buoyantly concluding many of his melodious bursts with our special whistle. He even started coming back to the front porch to occasionally take some raisins or even fly in from a nearby perch to retrieve raisins we would toss out to him. His song seemed far less frantic and desperate than it sounded during the immediate aftermath of his mate’s death. We even spotted another smaller Catbird lurking around in the brush near the birdbath while he was up in a nearby branch singing away. Was it a potential new mate? Or perhaps one of his offspring from the first brood he and our beloved Catbird girl had already raised earlier this summer? We will likely never know for sure. The only truth we know for certain is that our lives were profoundly touched by the experience of our beloved Catbird girl. Her exquisite beauty and the fragile bond of trust we shared with her were miraculous gifts and we are deeply grateful for the countless moments of joy she brought to our lives. Through her, our new Robin friend continues the tradition by visiting us everyday for raisins and mealworms. Through her, her mate continues to sing his unique song with its incorporation of our special shared Catbird whistle. Through her, I more clearly grasp that the love and joy we imbue into our shared experiences with all other beings never truly dies, but instead lives on, long after we are gone. Through her, I am more alive. And through me and through Kevin, via all of our future experiences and connections with other people and other creatures, she yet lives. Forever.

Please click here to read our backstory with this special Gray Catbird.

WRITTEN BY STACEY. ALL PHOTOS TAKEN BY EITHER KEVIN OR STACEY (EXCEPT AS NOTED).