The Outpost

Looking up, their pillowed bellies balanced expertly on twigs against an endless backdrop of twinkling constellations.

Roo tugged at her leash, her attention closer to Earth level than mine, as she sniffed and pulled me forward.

But I kept looking up. After all these years in Nicaragua, I’d never seen Urracas sleeping.

In waking daylight, these beautiful blue magpies (sometimes called blue jays) are the gangsters of the sky. Unafraid, balls-y, territorial, and thieving.

They’ve swooped and stolen loaded nachos from unexpected, outstretched hands; hands occupied in a conversational gesture with humans, not as an invitation for the Urracas.

I’ve seen them peck furiously at the side mirrors of parked motorcycles until the mirror cracked. They’ve clawed and bitten at window screens, intent to destroy, enter, and probably destroy again once inside.

They’ve devoured unhatched eggs, sadly victimizing smaller species of birds. In an equally impressive and horrific display of teamwork, they have hunted, trapped, and eaten a live snake, which I suppose also makes them calculatingly murderous.

Unguarded fruit bowls, unaware prey, and human objects that annoy them are never safe.