Living in the UK has made me really interested in nature and wildlife! Especially, spending time in the Welsh countryside from spring to early summer this year gave me plenty of encounters with various wildlife, which helped me memorise some species of birds such as blue tit, yellow wagtail, robin and more.
Most of those encounters with birds happened in front of the house or in the garden, except, this one incident. The ‘accidental meeting’ a couple of months ago occurred inside the house…
A story about a European robin pooing on the toilet (cover) in the house.
It was around 8 a.m. (BST) on the 2nd of June. Having let Josh’s family dog out for his morning business somewhere at the edge of the garden, we kept the french door open for some fresh air. A bold European robin gatecrashed our breakfast when we all were in the kitchen to start our day. None of us noticed it until I was heading to the utility room at the back to get yogurt for my breakfast. (The main fridge was at the back of the house).
European robins are definitely one of my favourite birds that I see in the UK; even so, I was perplexed and a bit scared seeing one inside the house frantically flapping its wings! The robin was as bewildered as I was, trying its best to get out, but hitting itself into the wrong windows in the process.
Obviously, it didn’t want to come to us although we were only trying to help it return outside. It ended up flying into the utility room and getting lost again. I quickly followed it and opened the back door connecting to the outside and closed the one to the inside, and just waited.
Ah yes, I was going to get yogurt from the back fridge, wasn’t I? Well… I didn’t manage it, fearing a chance of the robin flying into the fridge while I attempted to open it.
After finishing my breakfast with just banana slices and granola, I returned to the back and carefully opened the inner door. Fortunately, the robin had finally found the exit through the open outer door; but it didn’t disappear quietly as I spotted its signature on the toilet cover in the utility room…
Later, Josh’s mother told me this robin had previously wandered by the table outside the french doors. As a matter of fact, Josh had seen it on the table this morning and called me, but it flew up onto a tree in the garden as soon as it sensed our observation. This robin must have been either very curious, or ambitious to make the house its territory besides the garden!
From our perspective, this is quite a good episode of ‘when a robin used the house for its morning business’; but I wonder how the robin will recall this story amongst its fellows…?
After this morning, I don’t remember seeing the bold robin for some time; but just like humans who forget and repeat their previous mistakes, I noticed the robin returning to the tree & bushes in the centre of the garden, looking towards the house. European robins are certainly full of character!
