Before chatzos he headed out of the Bais Medrash to the bakery on the same street, and collected the crumbs from the bread machine tray into a bag. With these breadcrumbs in hand, he made his way to the park. As soon as he neared, literally hundreds of birds came from all directions to greet him. He would feed the birds with outstretched hands, breadcrumbs direct from the palm of his hand. He used to say he was tipping them. We understood that they got a tip for uplifting all the tefillos among the inyonim he achieved this way. He once told us that the birds revealed to him the future and all things that would come to pass. When people wondered where he got certain astonishing information from and how he could possibly know it, he said the birds had told him. He had a special seder and avoda concerning which bird ate from which hand. Some birds he pushed away and they had to circle and come back. He would sometimes transfer the breadcrumbs from one hand to another and the birds from one hand to the other. Everything with a purpose in mind.
There was once an argument between two gentile nations and their bickering was reported in the press. The papers all had their theories of what war was brewing. Reb Moshe remarked, “They will say that the goyim fight and hit one another, and I say that it’s not the Russians or anyone else; it’s the Nazis!” People thought he was joking, but a few days later the newspaper headlines all confirmed what Reb Moshe had said. How did he know? “The birds told me,” is what he answered.
