arf@chinet.chi.il.us (Jack Schmidling) (07/31/89)
aliens/e5
ALIENS IN REC.BIRDS
First a few words about the netequitte question brought up.
Considering the volume of birding postings I have seen since
I started reading this newsgroup, the idea of even bring up
the subject seems a little outrageous. I have no problem
killing subjects I am not interested in as long as they are
generally related to the overall topic, birds in this case.
However, the indoor "birders" need to recognize that it is a
courtesy extended by the birders defined in the charter and
in the event of a substantial increase in voulme, the
"little old ladies in the tennis shoes" have priority.
.........................
ALIENS AT THE FEEDER
Part I
Some of you may remember the cartoon published in Audubom
some years ago that outraged so many bird lovers. It was
the "final solution" for sparrows. It was a bird feeder
that somehow trapped sparrows and dropped them down a shute
where a hungry cat was waiting.
Were it not for the fact that I loathe cats even more than
sparrows, I would have probably built one. So I came up with
a method that is not only much more humane but it is great
fun and works on squirrels too.
I have come to the conclusion over many years of feeding and
studying birds, in an urban environment, that indiscriminate
bird feeding is counter-productive.
The most obvious problem is that you enhance the already
greater survival rate of the more aggressive alien species.
As an ecosystem can only accommodate a given number of
birds, the alien birds displace the native species and
diversity suffers.
The not-so-obvious problem is that having a hoard of
screaming sparrows, house finches and pigeons around all the
time, seems to discourage the native birds from even
attempting to feed. The reason it is "not-so-obvious" is
that you have to stop feeding totally (difficult for bird
lovers to do) for awhile to discover that there are more
native birds around than when you feed.
Selective feeders like hummingbird and thistle seed feeders
are a limited step in the right direction but making food
available for cardinals, blue jays and other desired species
has always been a problem here. They are only occasional
visitors and as luck usually has it, the feeder was cleaned
out by the sparrows or squirrels and they go away with ill
feelings toward the habitat.
THE NOT SO FINAL SOLUTION
To deal with the sparrows and squirrels, I ran a wire out to
the large, centrally located tray feeder and put a very loud
buzzer at the feeder end of it and a switch and battery in
the porch viewing area. When a sparrow shows up ... BUZZ ..
gone, instantly. This, system requires an observer/operator
of course but when you get right down to it, most people
feed birds so that we can watch them anyway.
It solves the immediate problem of never again having to
look at a sparrow in the feeder but it also provides great
opportunities to experiment with bird behavior. For
example, can they be trained to give up and never come back?
If you put a very small amount of food out when observing,
there will never be any at other times. Can they be trained
to come around on your schedule?
Do all birds react the same way to the buzzer?
Unfortunately, the answer to the last is a frustrating no.
And would you be surprised to find out that all the
squirrels in my neighborhood seem to have a hearing problem?
..........to be continued............
In part II we will tell you how we overcame the ultimate
nuisance and post some of the results of the experiment.
Jack Schmidling (arf)