It's all about birds

Things found while Web-surfing. Snopes.com debunks the story that the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas" contains hidden references to Christian doctrine, adding that the "five golden rings" are ring-necked pheasants. If true, that would establish an earliest date for the song: when were those birds first imported from Asia? (They were brought to the Willamette Valley of Oregon about 1881, I think--their first North American importation.)

And while we are debunking, Snopes says "Ring around the rosie" does not contain any reference to the English bubonic plague outbreaks of either the 14th or 17th centuries.