Birds in the garden...

I question not if thrushes sing,
If roses load the air;
Beyond my heart I need not reach
When all is summer there.
(John Vance Cheney)
The service berry continues to be a feast for the birds. Daily, I watch as dozens of robins, a few brown thrashers, two flickers and one catbird visit and perform swinging branch trapeze acts while feasting on the berries. They do not even wait for them to ripen so hopefully this young robin is not getting indigestion from eating green fruit (remember those green apples of our youth?).
The bush is only about 10 ft from the house so I just stand at the window to take these photographs. While standing there I saw two wrens start to fight mid-air. They ended up landing on the floor of the gazebo and continued the fight.
One had the other's beak held shut with his foot and continued to peck the other while he pushed away with his feet.

I became obvious that this would be a fight to the death as it lasted about 3-4 minutes before I went out there and intervened. I was able to walk right up to them before the more agressive one finally let go and flew off. The 2nd one hobbled under the cover of flowers so I do not know how injured he was.
They are such cute little birds filling the gardens with song but are one of the most agressive birds out there. They will even go into other nests and destroy the eggs or kill the babies in order to protect their territory. This spring I witnessed a fight to the death between a mouse that had moved into a bird house and a wren. The mouse was bloodied and pecked to death around the head/neck and the wren laid next to it until it too died. Nature isn't always pretty...