What Has Happened to All the Birds?

Winter has arrived with a vengeance here. Suddenly we have lots of snow on the ground and temperatures that stay below freezing during the day and hover around zero at night. The bird feeders are full of mixed seed, thistle seed, black oil sunflower seeds and big chunks of beautiful white suet. We have the snow, the cold temperatures and the feeders all ready to go… what we don’t have this year are the birds.

Instead of dozens and dozens of chickadees flying in and out of the feeders, we now see only three. There are five or six woodpeckers, four bluejays and eleven mourning doves… and yes, mourning doves will eat from an elevated feeder. Despite the heavy snowfalls over the past two days, there are no other birds around. What’s it like in your area? Are you missing birds at your house too?

The Audubon Society and several other local bird information sources insist that nothing is wrong… that because of the warmer than usual fall weather and the unusually abundant sources of natural food… the birds are still finding plenty to eat in the wild. Another explanation they’re giving is that bird populations naturally fluctuate from year to year and that a feeder that is really “busy” one year may have few birds the next.

This is all true, but we have been feeding birds here for many, many years and it is obvious that there is something very different happening (or not happening) this year. We had the normal number of birds all last winter and into spring and early summer. I think it was in July when we first noticed that there weren’t as many birds around as usual. We keep one feeder filled all summer, and we usually have baby birds perched on or around it with the parent birds feeding their babies from the feeder. I love watching them, and their screeching is hard to overlook, so I know for sure that this year there were no baby birds being fed at this feeder. We also didn’t see the usual number of baby robins.

I wonder… was it just too cold and wet for this summer’s baby birds to survive? Did this year’s organized spraying campaigns kill the birds as well as the massive caterpillar population? Or did the birds just go somewhere else looking for better weather?

I hope they are OK and that they come back. I miss them!

Written by Shirley | Filed Under Enjoying Nature, Personal, Simple Living, Voluntary Simplicity

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Comments

Comment by cricket:

I have the feeder this year and bread that I have thrown or the Hippy thrown out one. We do not have as many birds niether this year. All I can say is a long hard cold winter once it sets in. 2 inches here and feet in the South Towns.

Comment by goldfish:

I’ve noticed the same thing here in central PA. I even bought a nice “squirrel-proof” bird feeder this year. I was beginning to fear that it was bird-proof, too! So far just a few chickadees, juncos, titmice and a cardinal couple have stopped by.

Comment by Debbie:

We just moved to this place in April so I am not sure what is normal here but I do know that I rarily saw a Robin. My computer sits next to a large window that has a couple huge bushes in front of it. Usually in the mornings I can sit at here with my coffee and enjoy cardinals, chickadees, wrens, etc… We didn’t feed them this summer but we did put a couple feeders out when it started turning cold and I don’t think they have really noticed them yet.

I miss our old place. We had tons of bluebirds and finches there and I enjoyed watching them play in the snow.

Stay warm,
Debbie

Comment by Jo:

I am not sure but I think the windmill “farms” that are beginning to scatter the landscape here in Maine have taken their toll on the bird population. I have been doing a lot of research on these 400 foot monsters and have concluded that they will (or have already had) a negative effect on bird populations.

Rachel Carson wrote about a “Silent Spring” due to the poisons mankind has put into our environment. Wouldn’t it be a kick in the butt to find out we have another silent spring and winter) due to trying to clean up the environment.

The sad truth about the wind farms is that not one of them, worldwide, has closed one coal-fired plant. And none of the electricity generated here in Maine will benefit Maine people.

I have not been able to get an honest assessment about the impact of windfarms on the environment and wildlife and especially birds from the people who are making the big bucks building these “farms”. I doubt if they care about birds or anything else except their profit.

I saw my first winter cardinal this evening. I cried because we used to have so many of them. And our sweet juncos (snowbirds) that used to come in huge flocks are all but gone. We have the titmice, chickadees, both kinds of nuthatches, a couple of woodpeckers and some sparrows and mourning doves but not in the numbers of last year.

I hope I am wrong about windfarms. I hope the birds make a comeback. I hope it is just what you suggested, Shirley, that the cold wet summer was not good for the survival of the baby birds.

I hope because a planet (or just a backyard feeder) without birds is incomprehensible to me.

Comment by Jo:

One more thing, Shirley, (and anyone else interested) — go to http://www.windwatch.org/ and click on a video called “A Rough Wind”. It is a 20 minute film about the impact on birds and wildlife by the wind industry.

Windwatch is an invaluable site if you want to get educated about the wind industry and its impact on our environment.

Comment by Jo:

oops. That’s http://www.wind-watch.org/

Comment by Sylvia:

I haven’t noticed a change this year. I sit in a place where I can see our yard all day and we still get plenty of finches, siskins, chickadees and titmouses (mice?) I’ve even seen some cedar waxwings some warblers and vireos, in addition to a host of tree clinging birds and armies of robins. I don’t have a feeder but, I do grow berry producing bushes (like viburnum and wild roses.) I also have a bird bath with a water drip. Each morning, I dump the block of ice and put warm water in it and the wildlife arrives right away. The poor things really need water these days, even if all you have is pie tin to place on the ground, it will help.

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