Grackles

A large group of Grackles is referred to as a “plague.”

I don’t disagree. As I sat at the café in the above photo, I was told they were brought in to control the mosquito population, but some quick research proves that statement to be inaccurate—they eat bugs that can harm plants, but they also eat plants. One web site recounts how some people tried to scare off a plague of Grackles that had possessed a tree: They set off fireworks under a metal trashcan directly under its branches, hoping the noise would make them fly away. The Grackles just moved to a different tree.

The plague convinced those in the local ivory tower—University of Texas in Austin—to resort to violence in a fashion becoming of Texans: they bought shotguns to scare them off. Didn’t work though.

The plague of Grackles is the only drawback of the city of Austin, and for a visitor, it’s more humorous than annoying. Sure, their nests can spread a nice respiratory disease and the uric acid from their droppings can corrode stone and metal, but…they have such unity!

I've spent some time trying to make lazy analogies from Grackles to colonialism, Grackles to religion, etc....but that is too easy, and it'd be doing a disservice to the birds. So I leave it at this: Austin, if the apocalypse ever arrives, at least you can eat the Grackles.