An Ingenious Recycler
Recycling is the process of converting waste materials into new materials and objects. In the natural world, agents such as fungi and bacteria that turn dead plant and animal matter into air, water and nutrients come to mind. If you broaden the definition of recycling to include the re-use of material, however, many more organisms come into play.
Some humans continue to feed birds in the spring after Black Bears have emerged from their dens. The bears have not eaten for four or five months and once their digestive system adjusts, they are extremely hungry. Available bird feeders are often raided by hungry bears at this time of year, and end up discarded on the forest floor with the seeds they contained ending up inside the bears’ stomachs. Eventually the bears defecate and their feces contain little else but the husks of sunflower seeds interspersed with intact seeds. Keen-eyed Black-capped Chickadees are very quick to take advantage of these recycled sources of protein. (Check the Chickadee’s beak closely.)
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Woodland Recycler
The ability to find food is crucial for all creatures. It involves looking in every potential location, including the waste material of other animals. Nothing goes to waste in the natural world, and I was fortunate to observe an example of this recycling phenomenon recently in bear-inhabited woodlands.
Even though feeding birds is discouraged at this time of year due to the seeds’ appeal to hungry, emerging Black Bears, many find it a hard habit to stop. Inevitably Black Bears will smell the seeds in feeders and help themselves to them. If this continues long enough, the bears will become habituated and eventually this can lead to their being considered a nuisance, which can lead to their demise. Thus, it’s best to stop feeding birds now that Black Bears have emerged from hibernation.
That said, those who continue to fill feeders in the spring and have had them raided by bears need not fear that their birds are without recourse should they find the feeders empty or missing. Much of what goes in comes out, and bears deposit their seed-laden scat throughout the woods, creating ground “feeders” for all kinds of creatures. In this instance, a Black-capped Chickadee repeatedly helped itself to uncracked sunflower seeds amongst a great deal of millet and sunflower seed husks in the scat of a Black Bear.
This post is dedicated to Sadie Brown, Solid Waste & Recycling Coordinator for the town of Melrose, MA.
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Cedar Waxwings Conserving Energy
Your eyes are not fooling you. A Cedar Waxwing is visiting a Baltimore Oriole nest. Why? If you had the choice between scouting the landscape for an odd board here and there with which to build your house, or going to a deteriorating, abandoned house and helping yourself to a goldmine of available lumber, which would you choose? The oriole nestlings have fledged — their nest has served its purpose. It’s highly unlikely that the parents would ever use the nest again. Waxwings, which are relatively late nesters, discovered the abandoned nest and are taking advantage of the oriole’s (female builds nest) hours of collecting raw materials. Fiber by fiber a pair of Cedar Waxwings pulled this nest apart and recycled what they removed.
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