Red-breasted nuthatches are a strong species
The white-breasted nuthatch is a familiar bird to many feeders in our region.
This small songbird is snowy white below and wears a coat of slate-blue above. A bold black stripe caps its head and neck. Most notable, perhaps, are its foraging tactics.
Nuthatches creep along tree bark in the manner of woodpeckers, but they invariably head down trunks and limbs. Woodpeckers almost always head up the trunks.
Nuthatches visit feeders, and for most of the year — and some years, all year — we must make due with only white-breasted nuthatches. It is the only one of North America’s four nuthatches that is a resident in central Ohio.
But another nuthatch does occur in Ohio — the tiny red-breasted nuthatch. This northerner is a rare localized nester in the Hocking Hills, Mohican State Forest and scattered areas in extreme northeast Ohio. But most breed in the vast boreal forest that blankets the northernmost U.S. and
much of Canada.
However, these tough little birds do pay us wintertime visits, at least some years. Red-breasted nuthatches are intimately associated with the coniferous trees that make up much of the boreal forest. In warm seasons, they glean plenty of insects, especially beetles, caterpillars and spiders.
Come the long, cold northern winter, the easily obtained insect bounty largely vanishes. Then, nuthatches switch to a diet heavy in conifer seeds, particularly those of fir and spruce.
Roughly every other winter, the nuthatches stage major southward incursions, with some birds even reaching the Gulf Coast and Mexico. Snowbirds seeking a Floridian vacation? Not hardly. Elfin, 10-gram red-breasted nuthatches are tough as nails.
In the accompanying photo, a redbreasted nuthatch perches on the end of my camera lens. They are not shrinking
violets, although the seed I put atop the lens helped draw them in. I was standing in a forest in Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario, Canada, and the temperature was about 5 degrees below zero.
It isn’t cold that drives the nuthatches south, it’s the lack of food. The conifer seeds that are their wintertime staple are cyclical, with big crops every two to three years. Alternate years are
relative busts with few seeds produced.
As long as food is plentiful, redbreasted nuthatches ride out winter in the north woods. One or two evenings during my January 2018 Algonquin foray, it dipped to 20 degrees below zero. The nuthatches were unfazed.
Southward incursions of boreal birds are known as irruptions, and birders down this way eagerly anticipate them. I began to hear occasional red-breasted nuthatches in August. By October’s end they were everywhere, statewide and far beyond, and were visiting my feeders along with the local white-breasted nuthatches.
If the pattern holds, it might be winter 2022-23 or 2023-24 before we again see many red-breasted nuthatches.
This isn’t the only boreal irruptive species. Pine siskin — a close relative of the American goldfinch — is another. Siskins are also appearing in large numbers. Watch for small, brownish, heavily streaked birds with a yellowish wash in the wings and tail. Siskins often travel in flocks, sometimes sizable. Groups of up to 200 have been recorded in years past. Anyone entertaining such numbers had better increase their thistle seed budget. Far rarer irruptives include common redpoll, evening grosbeak, red crossbill and white-winged crossbill. If any of these appear at your place, give me a shout, please.
Naturalist Jim Mccormac writes a column for The Dispatch on the first, third and fifth Sundays of the month. He also writes about nature at www.jimmccormac.blogspot.com.