5,000 Light Years From Birdland

Have you noticed? There's a lot more birds in the neighborhood, and no I'm not just talking about those wooden ones suspended on wires over the intersections. Their audible presence is easily heard, chirping, tweeting and warbling at all hours of the day. During the Griffith Park Fire, they seemingly fled to the treetops of surrounding neighborhoods and exactly two months later, they're still around. refugees from an infernal disaster. Like New Orleanian evacuees from Katrina, these birds are making their music elsewhere because there's no home to return to. Two months after Mt. Hollywood glowed like a volcano in the night sky, the extreme eastern end of the Santa Monica Mountains look like an extremely bad haircut with some parts covered with brush and flora, and others a barren, ash-draped landscape. With no rain for a good several months (if we're lucky) and the eventual mudslides that will occur (wouldn't want to be in in the Los Feliz hills during the next rainstorm...), it's gonna be a long while before these winged refugees, all presumed to be living within a 2-3 mile radius of the park, return home. I wonder though if they will ever return home. Perhaps El Alcalde can get his mind off poontang for even just a few minutes and step up his Million Trees LA campaign to increase it severalfold. In addition to the fire-ravaged areas, it might be a good idea to have a few more planted in the Hollywood flatland areas, Los Feliz and AWV to help out our new fine-feathered neighbors. I might just plant a few more trees in the hood in addition to the handful of street trees I've already planted around here. According to the MTLA website, "Los Angeles has 18% tree canopy cover, which is below the national average of 27%." Wow, I guess this Militant watched too much Live Earth the other day.

Speaking of the birds, any real-life William Forresters out there who can spot and ID some our two-winged neighbors? I'm too busy being a Militant to know the difference between a great blue heron and Gil-Scott Heron.