Concerning a number of posts about feeding and warming hungry and cold
birds:

I've probably posted similar thoughts in other years, but it seems
appropriate to again give my thoughts on this subject.

While it is a natural for those of us who love wildlife to want to save
distressed, cold and hungry wildlife, and it is probably good for the
individual birds and likely good for those species that may use the food we
provide or the other resources we may provide, I would want people to
realize that helping these birds through rough times can also come at a
cost. When extreme weather, whether cold or hot, dry or flood, kills some
animal or plant it also then most likely gives an advantage to some other
plant or animal that is better adapted to that cold, heat, dry or flood or
the plants and animals that were otherwise negatively impacted by that now
dead plant or animal. These surviving animals and plants have frequently
been in competition with the now dead plant or animal for food,
nesting/shelter spots, sun, water or nutrients or may have been eaten by an
animal that the extreme weather is killing.

While the advantages of feeding certain wildlife at certain times may
outweigh the costs by one calculation or another, I'd like people to think
just a bit more about the cost side of the equation. While the cute birds
are eating seed and suet during the day, at night cute Norway Rats are
eating the same food. Then during the nesting season those rats who surived
and who successfully raised young due to the supplemental feeder food will
feed on any eggs or chicks that they can reach. How many of our songbirds
that have been in decline nest in sites most accessable to these rats? The
American Crows and Eastern Gray Squirrels also feed on eggs and chicks and
most likely have higher numbers through the songbird nesting season due to
having been fed through the winter from our feeders (and garbage pails).
The European Starlings and House Sparrows that we help may later compete
with rarer native Purple Martins and Western Bluebirds for limited cavity
nesting sites.

By feeding and clothing the hungry and cold species that are adapted to our
bird feeders and adapted to using the man-made miniature winter coats we
offer, we may put "wilder" species at a disadvantage that are less well
adapted to using the kind of foods that we humans offer or refuse to wear
those silly little coats. For example, many birds that eat seed as adults,
primarilly feed their young caterpillars. The survival of additional seed
eaters through the winter, who then gather additional caterpillars for their
young during the nesting season will mean fewer caterpillars to go around,
and may mean lower survival of the chicks of the more strictly insectivorous
songbirds (both resident and migrant) that don't come to our feeders. It
may also harm those moth and butterfly species that now have greater
predation pressure due to additional predators that made it through the
winter on human handout seeds. It seems to me that these days there are
both fewer strictly insectivorous birds and fewer moths and butterflies than
there once were, but there are many reasons for this, and I doubt that
feeders have been that big a factor in this equation.

If we gave some of the time and money we now spend on feeding distressed
animals instead on protecting and restoring the habitats of the native
plants and animals that are at greater risk we would be doing more to help
the organisms that really need our help. We would also do more to save the
incredible natural heritage and biodiversity that enriches our lives.

Yesterday I was at a friend's house and while I generally prefer that
feeders not be used, his 3 year-old niece was learning the birds at the
feeder and gaining a love of nature through this feeder bird watching. I
suspect that the benefits of playing favorites with the beneficiaries of
this feeder outweighed the costs in this case. We are also working on
native habitat restoration at this site. I imagine that advantages of using
this feeder will be less as the girl, who may soon be fully infected with
the bug for nature, is old enough to understand advantages of favoring the
wilder wildlife over the wildlife that use our feeders. Also by then our
restoration work should have payed off in supporting a bit more of the
native plant and animal life that had declined as commercial and not so
commercial human activities had directly and indirectly driven them out.

Stewart Wechsler
Ecological Consulting
West Seattle
206 932-7225
ecostewart at quidnunc.net

-Advice on the most site-appropriate native plants
and how to enhance habitat for the maximum diversity
of plants and animals
-Educational programs, nature walks and field trips
-Botanical Surveys

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