Except for a few singletons and small contributions, this is the last readers’ animal contribution I have. Do you want to start the first work week in 2026 without animal photos? I hope not, so please send in your GOOD animal/wildlife photos. Contributions seem to have slowed to a trickle: a bad portent for 2026.
BUT, Athayde Tonhasca Júnior sent in a YouTube video taken by his wife (Fiona Thackeray), and he adds some text (mostly not his) below.
We have met the enemy and he is us (Pogo the possum)
A pied wagtail (Motacilla alba) confronts its doppelganger in Perth, UK. Footage by Fiona Thackeray:
For residents of Withycombe (an English village in Somerset), mirror-pecking can be a nuisance:
Love-sick birds have been plaguing a village by pecking and cracking car wing mirrors in the mistaken belief that their reflection is a potential mate. The situation has become so bad that motorists in Withycombe’s main street have taken to making special mittens to protect their mirrors from the onslaughts.
The culprits have been identified as a flock of grey wagtails that live beside the local stream in the West Somerset village. “It all started about two years ago,” said villager Marion Badcock. “We’ve all had to make the special covers in this part of the village near the ford.“If there’s two they don’t seem to bother but the single birds go mad pecking at themselves in the mirror.” She said the wagtails are obsessed by their self-image all year round, but it is “particularly bad now”. “It’s actually very funny to watch them,” she said. “They’ll look at themselves in your wing mirror, then do their business all over it, then fly on to the window ledge of the house to have a go at the glass. It’s as if they are saying ‘look what we’ve done’.”
Peter Exley, of the RSPB in the South West, explained: “Birds in general will do this at this time of year. “It’s all down to hormones. They get very territorial – if they see a reflection in a mirror they see it as an adversary. “The bird says ‘I’m going to see off that intruder in my area’ and then they get very agitated – so much so they can make an unfortunate mess.” He added that mirror attacks are not good for the birds’ stress levels: “Most of these birds don’t pair for life and there’s a whole load of strategies for finding a mate. “And if you’ve got cars parked near a river where grey wagtails are nesting – there’s only going to be one result.” National Biodiversity Network, March 2009.
That is a problem! Do people put oven mitts over their wing mirrors? That would be meme-worthy, since it would look funny.
In south-central PA (where I live) cardinals also exhibit this behavior–only it’s normally against window panes, as opposed to car mirrors (though they also attack those). It’s almost exclusively male behavior, presumably attacking “rivals.” Sometimes keeping blinds lowered helps.
Similar circumstance a few years ago involving a very determined male robin and a window my mom’s house in Wisconsin. The bird was unduly persistent but not injured.
Those pesky hormones!
I miss Stephen Barnard’s pix.
Years ago I put a large mirror in a chicken enclosure to see what would happen. The reactions of the hens were hilarious. Some looked behind the mirror trying to find the “other hen”. Others would freeze in front of their image as if waiting for the “other hen” to make the first move. When the “other hen” did not move, they would become agitated to the point of attacking the mirror. After a few days however, all the hens simply ignored the mirror images. The rooster, on the other hand, ignored his reflection from the very beginning!