I've wondered about snowberry, too. I have a few small, but very healthy
plants that produced a large crop of snowberries this year. As usual, none
appeared to get eaten while the berries were bright white. After a few
weeks of freezing, they shrivel and turn tannish/brown. Then, they begin
disappearing, but I'm never sure they are falling off or being eaten.
Perhaps the bright white color indicates they are not yet palatable.
(Surely, some research has been done on this.)

With respect to fruits in general, I'm interested in the sequence of fruit
availability, especially towards the end of winter. In my yard, the fruit
(native and exotic) is eaten in roughly this sequence:

Summer: Cultivated cherries (major-league favorite of numerous birds, of
course)

Late summer/early fall: Viburnum, Golden Currant, Serviceberry Nove of
these have any berries left when winter comes.

Fall: The native Mountain Ash (don't remember the species; it's a shrub, not
a tree), followed by the European Mountain Ash. None of the Mountain Ash
fruits in my yard make it to winter, but they are so abundant in the city of
Pullman, I often see heavily laden trees well into mid-winter.

Late fall/early winter: The berries on a long row of some bush honeysuckle
or twinberry Not sure if it's a native or exotic. I keep meaning to check
it out. The small berries on these plants are usually very abundant and a
few may last into winter.

Early to mid winter: Cotoneaster (exotic; big House Sparrow and Song Sparrow
favorite). Native wild rose hips. The rose hips usually last through the
first part of winter, but the bushes are already nearly bare this year. The
apples on the ground. The apples (exotic) are a major midwinter favorite of
robins, varied thrushes, flickers, starlings, quail, and a number of other
birds. Depending on the year, the apples may disappear early or last well
into winter. Besides the apples themselves, a lot of birds seem to spend
time scratching the ground under the mushy apples, perhaps looking for cold
bugs. The shriveled snowberries may also begin to get eaten (or, as noted,
maybe just fall off).

Mid to late winter: This is when birds must really have it tough. All of
the premium food has been eaten. Whatever fat reserves the bird had, they
are probably used up. Snowberries, junipers, and some apple fragments are
about all they have here. I don't know how often the snowberries get eaten.
I've seen the junipers mobbed by flocks of robins in February.

Dennis suggested that the birds don't have insects to eat, but I'm not sure
that's completely true. If there is no snow on the ground, I see Varied
Thrushes tossing leaves around. Looking for frozen bugs underneath?
Flickers often dig down into the grass. I oten see Song Sparrows hopping
around at the bases of trees where the snow is thin. They are probably
looking for seeds blown against the tree, but I also wonder if they are
finding windblown insects, because Flicker and Magpies also spend a great
deal of time poking around the bases of trees. When there is snow on the
ground, the bird footprints are concentrated underneath the small tree
patch, where the ground and leaves are scratched up.

Kelly


_____

From: tweeters-bounces at mailman1.u.washington.edu
[mailto:tweeters-bounces at mailman1.u.washington.edu] On Behalf Of
FLECKENSTEIN, JOHN
Sent: Monday, December 04, 2006 2:16 PM
To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
Subject: [Tweeters] Snowberry



Birdologists,

In discussing snowberry with a botanically minded coworker, he told me about
a USFS web site called Fire Effects Information System (FEIS). The root
address is http://www.fs.fed.us/database/feis/ . I didn't have much luck
from that address, but starting from the site for snowberry,
http://www.fs.fed.us/database/feis/plants/shrub/symalb/all.html , I found
all kinds of cool stuff. There's limited information on food value, but
extensive information on ecology, distribution, habitat requirements, and
other factors. This site is a wealth of information on plant species with
some equivelent accounts of animals.



John Fleckenstein, Zoologist

Natural Heritage Program

Washington Department of Natural Resources

John.Fleckenstein at dnr.wa.gov

(360) 902-1674