Cooperative Living June 2015 - 3

THE INSIDE STORY
Margo OxenBill
Sherrod
dine's RURAL LIVING
column in this
issue, about the
annual return of the
songbirds, struck a
chord with me.
As the years
have rolled by I've increasingly
come to appreciate songbirds. Small
songbirds - wrens, and, this
spring, what I think were either
finches or sparrows - have been
nesting between panes of glass in
my shower-stall window five or six
years now.
Several broods of songbirds have
gone from egg to fledgling right
there at eye level in my bathroom
shower window. A couple of years
ago, I even saw a fledgling wren
leap off the window sill into the
wild blue yonder, at the urging
(apparently) of its nearby tweeting
mom and dad.
This year, I broke down and
invested in a little curtain to shield
the nest's inhabitants from my
grotesquely huge (in their view)
head and prying eyes as I took my
morning shower each day. No
doubt, the four or so dollars spent
on the cheap rod and curtain saved
the mother finch and her family a
lot of angst and stress.
Songbirds can make life nicer.
Their mellifluous warbling nearly
always elicits a smile and reminds
us that, no matter how dark our
musings, somewhere above us, a
bird is singing.
Rural folks really are blessed in
the wide range of birdsong that accents
their environs, an avian jam
session that city folks can only envy.
In addition to the music of mockingbirds,
cardinals, blue jays and
other birds that also call cities and
suburbs home, country folks are
treated to the sounds of birds like
bobwhite quail, wild turkeys, owls
and whippoorwills, 24 hours a day.
As Margo explains and implies
in her column, the return of the
songbirds - and their birdsong -
are among those little intangibles
that set the quality of rural life a
notch or two higher than the casual
observer might perceive.
It's rural living. 
- Bill Sherrod, Editor
12
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To inform you about your cooperative and its efforts to
serve your energy needs; how to use electricity safely and
efficiently; and the people who define and enhance the
quality of life in communities served by electric co-ops.
Contents
16
JUNE 2015
On the Waterfront
Faced with various challenges to their livelihood,
Virginia watermen have created a new tourism
that may help preserve a way of life.
12
On the cover: Chesapeake Bay oysters are one of many components in a
new heritage program aimed at preserving the waterman's way of life.
Photo courtesy Chesapeake Environmental Communications.
Energy-Efficient Can Be Strong!
Thinking of building your dream home, or adding
on to an existing home? Here are ways to make
energy-efficient strong, as well.
34
Hiding in Plain Sight
Disappearing acts are a way of life in the natural
world, where good camouflage can mean the
difference between eating and being eaten!
Wrath of the Wretched Wrens
The songbirds are back, a delightful annual
recurrence in rural living - even if some of them
are wretchedly wrathful little wrens.
Viewpoint
Mailbag
Whatzit?
40
History Mystery
Say Cheese!
Happenings
Currents
DEPARTMENTS
2
4
4
5
8
9
10
Bang for Your Buck 10
Local Co-op Pages 18
Healthy Take*
20
Caught in the Web*
Safety Sense*
16
34
40
21
22
It's Your Business* 23
Garden Muse*
Festivals & Fun
Reader Recipes
Rural Living
24
26
29
Stories from the Road 30
Classifieds
38
40
* not in all editions
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Please recycle this magazine.
1
STEVE BYLAND/HEMERA/THINKSTOCK
http://www.co-opliving.com http://www.facebook.com/cooperativeliving
Cooperative Living June 2015

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Cooperative Living June 2015
