Subject: Bluebirds. What are they eating in the sagebrush in early spring?
Date: Feb 20 11:54:10 2004
From: Ken Boettger - solowildlander at hotmail.com


I have several questions on bluebirds.

I am awaiting the opportunity to go up and visit the sagebrush country in
the Umptaneum north of Ellensburg. There are usually quite a few bluebirds
once the snow melts and the roads dry out some. It is a religion for me to
go witness the return of them as well as the meadowlarks.

I was talking to the owner of the sialis.org website (eastern bluebirds) and
she has a list of native food plants for bluebird landscaping and a bit
about western bluebirds too. I am trying to contribute to her list for the
western and mountain bluebirds (I operate a small native plant materials
company and collect for the native plant nurseries). In our conversation, I
mentioned that the bluebirds here in the sagebrush country where I visit
have very few berry producing shrubs. I know the bluebirds are insect
feeders, but they reportedly eat berries too. At least the eastern variety.
And they have also been known to take both sunflower and sumac seeds. I
currently include native smooth sumac (the non-poisonous variety) as well as
mealworms in one of my suet nugget recipes. In any event, I thought about
those bluebirds and the vast amounts of big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata)
seed heads and the early arrival before the bugs hatched.

What do they eat out in that sagebrush country with nothing but sagebrush
and rabbitbrush for miles around?

Down in the canyons and such, there are serviceberry, chokecherry, wax
current and other berry producing plants. I use those in my suet nuggets
later in the summer and fall. But berries typically are not available in
early spring (other than the few that overwinter).

My question is, does anyone know if bluebirds feed on sagebrush seed? I am
curious as there are lots of bluebirds here in the spring and there does not
appear to be a lot of insect activity and no berries for miles around out in
my viewing area. As a range and wildlife ecologist, I do know that big
sagebrush produces it's seed heads late in the year with dissemination Nov
into Jan and that much of the seed remains even until spring. So I am
guessing this is what they are feeding on?

Also, was wondering if there are bluebirds on the west coast? In particular,
the olympic peninsula? And if so, are there significant areas with high
incidence for observing them? Mountain or Western? There has been some
interest expressed for establishing some bluebird trails here in the west -
interest for the west side in particular.

I will be going out to search for bluebirds here in the next few weeks once
we get a couple spells of warmer weather to melt this snow. I am going to
try and observe their feeding. A sagebrush safari of sorts. If anyone is
interested, give me a hollar.

Ken Boettger
ken at wildlanders.com
Wildlanders.com
Ellensburg, WA
http://www.wildlanders.com/wildlanders/aaaasp/birding/nuggets.asp (free
samples)

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