CRITTER NOTES—

Living alone, it is hard for me to consume an entire loaf of bread before it begins to get stale. Usually, when I wind up with a half-dozen or so pieces I cube them with a bread knife and put them in a platform bird feeder.

That thrills the blue jays. One day recently a squadron of them emptied that feeder in 20 minutes flat.

While I was watching their coordinated assault goldfinches, both white and red breasted nuthatches, chickadees and titmice hammered the black oil sunflower and Niger seed feeders with abandon.

Oblivious to all that aerial activity a gray squired cavorted in the pines while smaller cousins, a red squirrel and a chipmunk tidied up the leavings under the feeders and a Carolina wren busied itself with tidbits of the thistle seed on the upper deck in what appeared to be friendly competition with a pair of juncos.

A belted kingfisher sat quietly on a lofty perch in the pine snags and seemed amused by the goings on. I think his belly was temporarily full.

Meanwhile, two pair of mallard ducks dabbled in the pond weeds along the dam and, in the background, far across the pond, four crows worked on the deer carcass until the turkey vultures arrived and continued the job after shooing the squawking crows up into the adjacent woods.

By human standards that sight is gruesome and sad.

But, it is part of nature’s cycle of life and death.

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Photo: A turkey vulture over the pond, pondering.