Peacock Walks at the Ranch - written 8/16/2008

As I parked my car at the Ranch one afternoon, I noticed a fawn feeding. I managed to get one photo before Mom saw me and took charge of the situation. I realized that that I had been seeing deer spoor. I can’t get close enough to the creek to see any tracks because the banks are too steep. But it’s there for me to enjoy, and I do. As I walked by the old caretaker’s cottage, I saw two black squirrels playing in the yard area. This is the first time I’ve seen black squirrels in this area.

The peacocks scream whenever someone they don’t know or don’t like (for example, the park rangers); but they know me now and don’t scream when they see me. I feel very safe when I’m with peafowl because as soon as the first peacock screams, I know he thinks there is some sort of danger. After the first male screams, the sentries scream the alarm clock-wise around the perimeter. I have an idea where the first male perceives danger so I can get an idea of what’s going on. Watching a crime show one night, the detectives encountered peacocks at a crime sight and one of them commented that the birds were the criminals' watch dogs.

The biggest danger is dogs or coyotes hunting the peafowl; occasionally a person chases them.
I always carry pepper spray now and sort of resent it, but I’ve seen dogs take down the birds and I would be delighted to spray one. I would rather spray the owner—it’s not the dog that’s bad—it’s an owner who doesn’t teach themselves how to handle their dog. Then, there are the ones who would like to have peafowl on the table. They are just huge pheasants, after all; they are indigenous to India.

Peafowl have been kept by the wealthy for centuries, because they are such great sentries. Also, they eat snakes. In areas where there are a lot of poisonous snakes, the peafowl keep the snake population down. I’ve only seen one snake in peacock territory in the 24 years I have been observing them.

The people who live near the Ranch want the birds gone because of their screaming and their droppings. The Ranch was donated to the city of Fairfield under the terms that the flock is maintained. There is a huge amount of open space there, and there are no snakes. At some point the birds will be removed; eventually the same residents will start coming across snakes, including rattlesnakes. How dumb is that?

The same thing is happening at Blue Rock Springs Park—which also has a huge amount of open space—there is a nice golf course there and the golfers face the same issues the people at the Ranch do and know nothing about it.

I have never seen a sign of a pheasant at either place, and I easily recognize pheasant feathers. I wonder if the peafowl are somehow dominant. Most people think that ring-neck pheasants are indigenous to North America; however, they were first introduced to the west coast in 1881 and to the east coast in the late 1880’s. These birds are indigenous to China; I find it amazing that they are common all over the country in just 120 years.

The Ranch is a “no trespassing” zone; I have become a sort of unofficial volunteer. Several years ago while I was out wandering, there was a motorcycle cop waiting to ticket people who were speeding. I noticed a mother quail walk across the street with nine brand-new chicks tow. They got down off the curb OK, but they couldn’t get back up on the other side. I put down my pack and water and crossed the street to help. I started scooping them up one at a time and delivered them to mom. The first person who drove up stopped and asked what I was doing. I showed her one of the chicks. She blocked traffic while I caught each one; the motorcycle cop was 100 feet away, and I could tell he was watching the whole thing in his rear-view mirror. Once I caught all of them and delivered them to mom, everyone drove away. The last to leave was the cop. He could have given me a ticket for trespassing.