Animal

Survival of the fattest: why the country birds are coming to town


As a child, I remember my nan throwing out a few crusts of stale bread for the birds. Not surprisingly, this attracted few birds apart from the odd sparrow or starling. Later on, we discovered packets of Swoop “wild bird food” at the local store, which brought in more interesting species, such as blue tits and greenfinches.

Feeding garden birds has come a long way since then. Today, they can enjoy a veritable smorgasbord of gourmet offerings: from tiny black niger seeds to kibbled sunflower hearts and from peanut cakes to fat balls, complete with added insects. Sometimes I wonder if we might be feeding our garden birds better than our kids.

All this comes at a cost – to us – of an estimated £200m a year. But maybe it’s worth it. For, as scientists from the British Trust for Ornithology and Exeter University revealed last week, our generosity is having a major effect on the behaviour, ecology and even evolution of these familiar species.

Take the goldfinch. When I began birding in the 1960s, this was a fairly scarce bird, found along hedgerows and in weedy fields. Today, goldfinches can be seen in four out of five gardens, welcomed for their musical twitter and striking gold, red and black plumage.

Other new visitors include the great spotted woodpecker, which has forsaken its usual woodland habitat for the rich pickings on bird tables; the sparrowhawk, now found in over half of all gardens; and flocks of long-tailed tits, which have learned to cling on to feeders.

A starling with its wings out



Starling numbers have dwindled in recent years. Photograph: Attila Kovács/EPA-EFE

Evolution is meant to progress at a snail’s pace: over thousands, if not millions, of years. Yet during the past few decades, the bill-length of various tit species has markedly increased because those with longer beaks have been able to obtain more food than their shorter-billed counterparts, and survive to pass on this characteristic to their offspring.

One species of warbler, the blackcap, has even changed its migratory habits, thanks to the food we provide. Blackcaps from central Europe, which used to migrate to Spain and North Africa each autumn now head west to the British Isles, where they find rich pickings in our urban and suburban gardens.

These changes have all happened during my lifetime, yet the British habit of feeding garden birds goes back much further. During the sixth century, St Serf of Fife hand-tamed a robin, which was later killed by his jealous fellow monks; much later, during the bitter winter of 1890-91, workers in London were seen giving the meagre contents of their packed lunches to starving songbirds.

But the real change happened in the 1980s, when a few farsighted entrepreneurs realised there was money to be made encouraging the British to be more adventurous in the food they put out for their garden birds. Out went the red net bags of peanuts, and in came a whole range of high-energy foodstuffs, complete with space-age style feeders, like the gigantic tubular one in my own garden. The number of species recorded using garden feeding stations rocketed, from a dozen or so to well over 100 different kinds.

Then, in 2005, came Springwatch, which turned our nation’s longstanding love of garden birds into a nightly entertainment show. During one episode, presenter Bill Oddie recommended putting out mealworms to help hard-pressed adult birds as they tried to find food for their hungry chicks. Just as “the Delia effect” saw shops sell out of a particular ingredient after a recommendation by the TV chef, “the Oddie effect” took hold, with a nationwide shortage of mealworms.

Bill Oddie with binoculars



When Bill Oddie recommended putting out mealworms on TV, a nationwide shortage ensued. Photograph: Mark Carey/BBC

Springwatch also put paid to the widespread belief that we should only feed garden birds during the winter. In fact, we should provide food all year round: the most crucial time is the early spring, when natural resources are at their lowest.

So, is bird feeding an unmitigated benefit to birds? Not everyone thinks so. Studies by the Zoological Society of London have shown that by concentrating so many birds in one place, bird feeders can aid the spread of disease: greenfinches are only just beginning to bounce back after being almost wiped out in gardens by the deadly parasite trichomoniasis. Predators such as domestic cats may also benefit from the artificial concentration of birds on a single feeder: from their point of view, a kind of all-you-can-catch buffet. Meanwhile, the numbers of traditional garden visitors such as house sparrows and starlings have declined rapidly since the 1970s.

In Australia, feeding garden birds is often frowned upon, especially by birders and conservation organisations. There are various reasons for this: some believe – probably wrongly – that bird feeding creates a “dependency culture”, leading to weaker individuals, and even threatening the futures of species.

The great spotted woodpecker.



The great spotted woodpecker. Photograph: Stefan Huwiler/REX

Others argue, with greater justification, that because most birds coming to feeders are the larger, commoner and more aggressive species, they will gain an unfair advantage over the smaller, scarcer and weaker ones. So, instead, Birdlife Australia encourages its members to create bird-friendly gardens, by providing natural food in the form of berry-bearing bushes and nectar-rich flowers, and water to drink and bathe in on hot days.

But this ignores one major benefit of feeding garden birds – the way it connects millions of people to the natural world. This is especially important for people who may find it hard to gain access to the wider countryside, including young children and sick, old, disabled or housebound people. For them, watching the antics of the birds is like having their own private Springwatch right on their doorstep.

As I write this, there’s a commotion outside my window. The blue tits and goldfinches scatter in the face of an unexpected new arrival: a gaudy black, white and red great spotted woodpecker landing on the seed feeder. It’s a sight I could never have imagined all those years ago, when feeding garden birds just meant throwing out stale bread on to our back lawn.

Stephen Moss is a naturalist and author based in Somerset whose recent books include The Robin and The Wren. He teaches the MA in travel and nature writing at Bath Spa University



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