Just the birds.

Riddle me this. Why are there so many references to birds in Macbeth? It's like every time something bad is going to happen (or has already happened), there's some weird reference to a type of bird, and generally the type of the bird is always linked to a specific character. For example, Macbeth was always referred to as an owl. In quotes such as, "A falcon, towering in her pride of place, was by a mousing owl hawk'd at and kill'd.", that's totally referring to Duncan (a falcon) being killed by Macbeth (an owl). Isn't that weird? Then there's Lady Macbeth's many references to ravens and crows whenever she's planning something evil, such as "The raven himself is hoarse, that croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan under my battlements." The bird reference that sticks out in my head, though, is when Macduff cries out over his children and wife having been murdered. He calls them "all my pretty chickens", which is really quite sad. Shakespeare made a whole lot of connection to birds, and there's even more than this! Kites, geese, wrens, eagles... That's a bunch of birds. Maybe Shakespeare wanted to be a bird watcher. I don't know, could have been a passion of his. Side-job? We'll never find out.