subject: If You Hear An Owl Get Naked [print this page] The cuckoo's first call in Spring provides annual reports in the letters columns of the UK 'Times' newspaper. Apparently from early times the number of calls a cuckoo made indicated different things whether you were a young person (the time when you would marry), a married couple (the arrival of your next child) or old folk (how much longer you had to live), and it is said that because the poor bird was kept so busy answering such enquiries, it had no time to build a nest and therefore had to offload its young on to foster-parents. Nonetheless, it is a lucky bird and it is widely believed that whatever state of health you are in at the time you hear the first call, so you will remain for the rest of the year. And a wish made at this time is supposed to come true.
Tradition claims it is the one bird into which the Devil cannot transform himself. Its association with love has come about because it was believed to be the messenger of Venus, although among miners it is considered ill-omened and no superstitious miner would go underground after seeing one flying near the pitshaft.
The Kingfisher is another very lucky bird, and to carry some of its feathers on your person is both a protection and a charm for good fortune. It got its beautiful plumage because when Noah freed the animals from the Ark after the deluge, the kingfisher was the first bird to fly away and thus got the red of the setting sun on its breast and the azure of the sky on its back.
Owls have carried a mixed bag of superstitions since time immemorial. The ancient Greeks revered owls and believed them sacred to Athena. Affiliated with the goddess of wisdom and learning, the owl was considered wise and kind.
But somewhere in time, the owl's reputation plummeted and hearing the hoot of an owl is now associated with bad luck. To counter evil owl power put irons in your fire. Or throw salt, hot peppers or vinegar into the fire, the owl will get a sore tongue, hoot no more, and no one close to you will be in trouble. When you hear an owl, take off your clothes, turn them inside out and put them back on. You might not want to do this if you are in public.
But there is one superstition that's good for women. Any man who eats roasted owl will be obedient and a slave to his wife.
The robin is perhaps the most loved of all wild birds and dire are the omens if you should kill one. The story that it was a robin who covered the unfortunate 'Babes in the Wood' with leaves to help them keep warm has done much to endear it to children everywhere. Legend has it that it got its distinctive red breast when it tried to pull the bloody thorns from Christ's head as he hung on the cross. The bird has also been regarded as sacred to the household gods since the earliest of times, and William Blake in his poem, Auguries of Innocence, insists:
'A Robin Redbreast in a Cage
Puts all Heaven in a Rage.'
A wish made to the first robin of spring will be granted.
