Yesterday shortly after lunch I heard the heelers making a racket upstairs, and went to see who was at the door.

A young girl and boy I didn't recognize.

She wanted to report two boys stomping on and killing a small bird that couldn't fly. She provided details, who did what, who said what.

This wasn't a tattle-tail.

She was serious and earnest. This was a concerned citizen reporting something that she knew had to be wrong to the nearest authority.

Me.

So I walked along as they rode their bikes back to the bird.

We had the usual discussion about how it is wrong to harm things just because you can. But I didn't know what we would find. I had to go through the difficult explanation as to why it might be wrong to stomp on birds but, depending upon the species stomped, it may not be illegal.

In our state, you can stomp on all the pigeons, starlings and house sparrows you want without violating any laws.

They're exotics that don't belong here, and we do nothing to encourage their survival. (A strategy I agree with, by the way, even though I have been known to occassionally provide aid and comfort to the enemy.)

So I think that by the time we got to the scene, she understood that if it was one of those three species, that would be the end of the matter.

She had on her bike helmet, and I asked the boy (her younger brother?) why he wasn't wearing his.

"Couldn't find it."

When we retrieved the dead bird, I was able to tell right away it was a protected species. Some sort of warbler, but not anything I recognized. I asked her again for the names of the two young culprits.

She knew they would be mad at her for telling, and didn't want her name involved. But she told me anyway.

When she had warned them she was going to turn them in, their response was "What do you care? It's only a bird."

You could tell that bothered her.

Got waylaid by a friend I hadn't visited with for months on the way home with the bird. As we chatted, the sister and brother peddled by again with some friends.

He had his helmet on. There's hope there.

At home I checked several field guides, and still cannot positively ID the bird. A juvenile, yes, and definitely a warbler.

But it is either a black-throated gray warbler that is missing its yellow lore spot and has mysteriously gained a few yellow feathers on the chin,

or a black-and-white warbler that is well out of its normal range, and has again grown yellow feathers on the chin where they don't belong.

Or a hybrid of one of those two species with something else, like a yellow-rumped warbler.

Sent an email to the game warden, with the hopes she will contact the families of the two boys and have a talk. Certainly no need for legal action with kids so young (especially when your damn biologist can't tell the Court exactly what they killed), but it is always more impressive, on both parents and kids, when the game warden shows up in full uniform with sidearm at your door.

Words like "take of a protected bird" and "possible loss of all hunting and fishing privileges" usually go a long ways with parents also.

But I was impressed by the young witness.

Such an advanced environmental ethic in someone so young. And the courage to act on her convictions.

We as a society must be doing something right. Even if we still have boys who stomp on things just because they can.