Reflecting on the unintended consequences of what we do in the natural world

The spastic movement coming toward me through the bare birch branches bore a resemblance to the military leap-frog means of approaching an enemy position. Except, this movement aloft, on plump feathered bodies, brought a smile and a bit of relief that warmed my heart.

Since establishing ourselves in the rural environment surrounded primarily by birch and cottonwood forest, Christine and I have enjoyed the consistent company of a medley of birds. Within a couple of days of moving in, a bald eagle perched atop the roof of our house, and we took it as a good sign of acceptance into the neighborhood.

Evidently, the environment we chose to make our home suited our feathered friends well. Black-capped chickadees, red-breasted nuthatches, English sparrows, pine grosbeaks, robins and others we have yet to identify keep the summer yard busy. Being the enormous eaters they are, the songbirds keep the mosquitoes and yellow jackets at bay. We can putz around the yard or hang out on the deck in peace without being covered in stinking bug dope.

The birds become quite friendly, and the flight patterns they sometimes take, within inches of our heads, are a bit unnerving for Christine. I think they know it, as they seem to strafe her much more than me. “You know,” she’ll say, “you laughing at them encourages their bad behavior.”

We didn’t have bird feeders to start. It didn’t seem necessary until a couple of years after being here, we noticed the chickadees, pine grosbeaks and nuthatches stayed for the winter. One February day, years ago, a flock of redpolls appeared. That’s when we decided maybe we should put out some food for them.

Not wanting to acclimate the birds to a feed trough, I found places around the property to spread seed on the ground and used birch limbs to create sort of a canopy over the food source. They could fly in and perch on the birch, then dart in for a seed and back up on a limb to eat it in relative safety.

The redpolls and chickadees, in particular, seemed to love the arrangement. The redpolls would show up late January or early February for many years and stay until heading north in April or May.

For several years, we enjoyed having somewhere around 100 birds zipping around seeds on the ground. The birdfeed bill became almost ridiculous, but having the beautiful little birds around became a staple of our peace of mind. It is often noted by folks in the field that healthy populations of songbirds are indicative of a healthy environment.

A few years ago, the redpolls didn’t return, and the numbers of the rest of the species dropped markedly. This coincided with the appearance of a feral house cat.

Domestic cats gone feral are believed to be the single most significant predators for songbirds. There seemed no reliable way to gauge how many birds the cat had killed, but the tracks in the snow left no doubt it had taken a fair amount.

Since we had no desire to kill the house cat, which appeared feral but could also be going home to someone who loved it, there seemed no choice but to cease feeding the birds.

Stopping the feeding didn’t keep the cat away. We would still see it stalking birds in the woods around the house. Its tracks repeatedly told the story of its success in killing birds. Sooner or later we figured, the cat would be gone, and that came this winter when all evidence of its presence disappeared.

This winter, with snowfall reminiscent of the 1970s taking a toll on wildlife, I thought it wouldn’t hurt to put out some bird feed now that the cat is gone.

I decided to try a different approach and maybe a better way to keep the birds safe while they fed. We have a deck set off from the house, and on it sits a picnic table, the only surface that hadn’t been shoveled. Clearing away all but 2 feet of snow from the table, I froze birch branches to hang over the flat area where I spread the birdseed. I reasoned this wide-open spot would prevent predators from sneaking up on the birds.

Within a couple of hours of distributing the black sunflower seeds, four pine grosbeaks showed up. Not much later, chickadees and nuthatches joined the feast. I had forgotten that these little buggers appearing so sharply dressed for dinner were pigs and had to replenish the seed supply in a couple of days.

That’s when the plump redpolls arrived and warmed my heart. When Christine got home it reminded me of a family reunion as we watched them flit about as they do. “Do you think they are glad to see us?” I grinned at Christine. She just shook her head, knowing it unlikely that any of the redpolls from years ago were even still alive.

The cat did not re-appear, but a couple of days after the redpolls showed up, there was a murder on the picnic table. A slight dusting of snow revealed squirrel tracks that seemed to point to the culprit. A necropsy of the deceased nuthatch showed a large tear in its throat. Whatever had killed the bird, it didn’t eat it, and that suggested either the squirrel or other birds in a fit of territorial defense. Life in the wild is not so pretty. Even so, at least the cat hadn’t returned.

A couple of days later, shoveling the deck for the 20th time this winter, a movement in the trees caught my eye. A small bird, yet bigger than a typical songbird, had lit on a birch branch to the east of the deck. A closer exam revealed it to be a saw-whet owl, a small bird of prey (about 7 inches tall) that preys primarily on rodents and flying insects.

Huh, I thought, and wondered if the adorable little bird would be trying to kill the songbirds. I took a break to feed the dogs, and when I returned, the owl sat on a hammer handle laying on a shelf above where we keep firewood for our fire ring and about spitting distance from the birdseed.

By nature, these diminutive owls don’t seem to mind human interaction and thus allowed me to approach much closer than one would expect from a predatory bird. Again, I wondered about the chance it would kill songbirds.

A bit later while walking toward the house, a cow moose that has frequented our place for several years, and is already food stressed and not in a good mood, had climbed up on a snow berm created by plowing our driveway, to eat birch branches now available thanks to the berm.

I thought to myself, it’s true, everything we do in our environment has some effect on the non-human inhabitants that we so often disregard in our pursuits.