"The Birds" is a novelette by British writer Daphne du Maurier, first published in her 1952 collection The Apple Tree. It is the story of a farmhand, his family, and his community that are attacked by flocks of birds and seabirds in kamikaze missions. The story is set in du Maurier's native Cornwall shortly after the end of the Second World War. By the end of the story it has become clear that all of Britain is under aerial assault.