Photo Tammie Hache/The Echo
Female Pine Grosbeak

Once again, it's been a pretty quiet week at the feeders.  Very little activity going on aside from Grosbeaks.  The Evenings and Pines are here off and on throughout the day and will clean off any seed I throw out onto the back deck and platform feeder.  I finally filled the feeders themselves a few days ago, for the first time since before Christmas!
Lots of folks are asking the same question:  Where are the birds this year?  Well, the easy answer is:  I don't know!!  It all comes down to food sources.  They have obviously found better natural food sources somewhere other than here.  Feeders are nowhere near enough to attract migrating birds.  They need natural food sources from native trees like Birch and Tamarack.  For some reason, seed production in this area is low this year so the birds have gone elsewhere to find it.  By the sounds of things, seed production west of here is better but oddly enough, I'm not hearing much about bird sightings in that direction either. 
The birds we DO have in the area seem to only be in certain neighbourhoods.  For example:  I have Evening and Pine Grosbeaks in my yard every day.  Not as many as in previous years, no, but they ARE here, normally 20 or so of each species at a time.  You would think they would be all over town, hitting feeders everywhere but they're not.  I've only heard about 2 or 3 flocks of them throughout the town all winter.  Pine Grosbeaks are here in much higher numbers than the Evening Grosbeaks are, to be certain, but Evening Grosbeak numbers are in great decline to begin with. 
The absence of the birds is most likely a cyclical thing.  Most winter finches, like Grosbeaks and Redpolls, are irruptive  species, meaning when a natural food source like Birch catkins is low in their normal winter range (i.e:  here), they will irrupt  into another area where that food source is plentiful.  These species also appear to have high and low cycles so next year, we could (and hopefully will) be completely overrun with them! 
Keep your feeders full and have faith.  If the winter birds don't take the seed, pretty soon the spring migrators will.  As long as you store your seed so it's cold and dark, it will last for months.  The main thing is to keep it DRY.
Happy Sightings!
Please stop in at the Echo to see my photo note cards for sale there.
tammie@theecho.ca   826-4561


 Advertisement