Pinnochio had a whale in his story. Or maybe that was Gepetto. A big one with room enough to sit up. Jonah had a whale, too. Or maybe we should say a whale had Jonah. Either way, there are no whales in Verdura. However, I wouldn’t want to be in front of the birds in these stories if they had their beaks fully open. You wouldn’t either.
They don’t actually eat people. Or animals. Or anything other than electrified plant spores. Trillions of them. That’s why they have such big beaks. They troll for spores like whales troll for plankton; back and forth, back and forth. Now, if you accidentally got in the way of that wide-open beak, which, of course, they can’t see around, I don’t know if they’d cough you out or swallow you. So if you happen to be up in the clouds in your kite as the spores are getting electrified––which I wouldn’t recommend anyway––I’d say it’s time to leave when the birds arrive.
And, by the way, I’d be real careful in the water if I were you. There’s lots and lots of little wormies that can make life pretty difficult if they get inside you. And their only joy in life is getting inside you. So watch out!