Seeing two magpies resting on her son’s horse was a new experience for Shelly Howarth Loring of Riske Creek.
She said she looked outside Wednesday, Feb. 12, and saw Victor, her son’s four-year-old quarter horse and draft horse had visitors.
There were two magpies sitting on the horse's back end.
“When I told my husband about it, he said that magpies like to eat the dead skin off the horses and he has seen that before,” she told the Tribune. “I have seen little cowbirds but this was my first time seeing magpies on a horse.”
Growing up on Cotton Ranch in Riske Creek, she saw magpies all the time.
“When I worked for ICBC in town with Dave Dickson, he loved magpies and was surprised when I told him, we always see them."
Howarth Loring and her husband Hugh own a couple of acres in Riske Creek where they live and have two sons - Tanner and Brandon, well-known as rodeo athletes.
When the boys were young they called magpies ‘penguin’ birds, Howarth Loring said.
The day before she spied the magpies on Victor, she was also surprised when the sound of a chickadee announcing ‘spring’s coming’ could be heard coming from down by the creek.
“I thought ‘what?’ It’s been so cold out,” she said.
Temperatures for the Riske Creek area continue to be cold for the next few days with a low of -17C for Feb. 13 and -20C for Feb. 14.
