Feed the birds? Research says wing it
Hand-feeding OK, but using right food is key
RENO — Wildlife biologists and forest rangers have preached the mantra for nearly a century at national parks like Yellowstone and Yosemite and for decades in areas where urban development increasingly invaded native wildlife habitat.
But don’t feed the birds? That may be a different story — at least for one bird species at Lake Tahoe.
Snowshoe and cross-country ski enthusiasts routinely feed the tiny mountain chickadees high above the north shore of the alpine lake on the California-nevada border. The blackcapped birds of Chickadee Ridge will even perch on extended hands to snatch offered seeds.
New research from University of Nevada scientists found that supplementing the chickadees’ natural food sources with food provided in feeders or by hand did not negatively impact them, as long as proper food is used and certain rules are followed.
“It’s a wonderful experience when the birds fly around and land on your hand to grab food. We call it ‘becoming a Disney princess,’” said Benjamin Sonnenberg, a biologist/behavioral ecologist who co-authored the sixyear study.
But he also recognized “there’s always the question of when it is appropriate or not appropriate to feed birds in the wild.”
Anyone feeding the birds should only provide food similar to what is found in their natural environment such as unsalted pine nuts or blackoil sunflower seeds, never bread or other human food, Sonnenberg said.
State wildlife officials said this week they generally frown on feeding wildlife. But Nevada Department of Wildlife spokeswoman Ashley Sanchez acknowledged concerns about potential harm are based on speculation, not scientific data.
The latest research project under the wings of Professor Vladimir Pravosudov’s Chickadee Cognition Lab established feeders in the Forest Service’s Mount Rose Wilderness and tracked populations of mountain chickadees at two elevations — both those that did and didn’t visit feeders.
“If we saw increases in the population size or decreases in the population size, that could mean we were hurting the animals by feeding them,” co-author Joseph Welklin said. “Our study shows that feeding these mountain chickadees in the wild during the winter has no effect on their population dynamics.”
Sonnenberg said he understood concerns about supplementing food for wild creatures at Tahoe, where bears attracted to garbage get into trouble that sometimes turns fatal, and not for humans. The bears may be killed because they no longer fear people.
“Feeding wildlife is context-specific and comes with nuance,” he said.
The project included scientists from Canada’s University of Western Ontario’s Department of Psychology, Kennesaw State University’s Department of Ecology, Evolution and Organismal Biology in Georgia and the University of Oklahoma’s Biological Survey.