Birding buddy Sharon and I just completed another fall bird count for the Carroll County Bird Club. It wasn’t long into our road trip before we saw our first LBJ (Little Brown Job).
We see lots of LBJs on our counts (me probably more than her since I will forever be a novice at this). They usually involve lively discussions about who it is. We sat in the car for at least 10 minutes trying to decide what we were seeing. This was just one bird, and we had hours of counting to go!
I saw stripes on the head, she didn’t. She claimed there was some yellow on it (where I don’t remember). Yellow? What yellow? On and on the discussion went. It was worse than being sisters!
We did agree it was some kind of sparrow. There are at least 13 different possibilities for sparrows in this region. That really narrows it down. This is why I officially petitioned the Board of Bird Identification (BBI) directly to insist their members wear teeny, tiny name tags around their necks. They must not be too teeny though so we can still read them with our binoculars.
I argued that only LBJs need to wear name tags. Sharon and I are smart enough to figure out the others (well, maybe Sharon is). Of course, I forgot about the zillions of juvenile birds that start out brown and then turn into those flashy, snazzy birds we all know and love.
And let’s not forget the shore birds and waterfowl. Some of them are not so little (I also petitioned for a new BBJ category — Big Brown Jobs). These bigger birds are still mostly drab brown and forever fall into the UFO category for me.
I soon discovered that the BBI does not work like the Better Business Bureau (BBB). They are not into customer service, especially with bird nerds like me. They are into survival (more on that later), so they flatly rejected my humble request. Imagine that!
We finally decided to move on but as I recall we never did come to a conclusion about our mystery bird. It fell into the “unidentified” category.
It seems like a little thing but it matters. If you watched or read the news recently, bird populations have dropped nearly thirty percent since 1970. This is documented in Science magazine’s Sept. 19 issue with a study entitled, “Decline of North American avifauna.”
Thorough scientific evidence backs up this significant decline. We have lost 2.9 BILLION birds over that time. Imagine if we put the shoe on the other foot and lost 2.9 billion people. You can bet we would sit up and take notice of that.
According to the findings, of the nearly 3 billion birds lost, 90 percent belong to 12 bird families, including sparrows, warblers, finches, and swallows. These are birds that we normally see all the time. They help spread seeds and eat lots of bad insects among their most vital roles.
I can vouch for this myself. Usually our yard is overrun with house sparrows in the spring and summer but not this year. I saw only one pair trying to nest in my bluebird houses. I counted only a handful of others since then. They are not my favorite birds but they obviously have a role to play in the ecology of my yard.
White-throated sparrows are another bird I usually see all the time. They have lost a third of their population. These are beautiful birds (I can actually identify them) and frequent visitors to our feeders. I see less and less of them.
The list goes on: song, field, fox, white-crowned, chipping and Savannah sparrows make up a lot of my bird watching throughout the year. They are an especially welcome sight at my feeders in the dead of winter with its cold, quiet and still days.
Juncos and blue jays are also on the list along with Baltimore orioles, rose-breasted grosbeaks and even the ubiquitous red-winged blackbird.
There are many reasons for their decline but up front and center is the alteration or complete disappearance of habitat. The birds are losing out to land uses such as development and intense, large scale agriculture.
Fortunately, we have the past to guide us into the future. By this I mean the continued success in waterfowl and raptor populations. They are on the up swing thanks to conservation efforts (hunters have played a large role in saving habitat for waterfowl) and the Endangered Species Act (the California Condor and American Bald Eagle are perfect examples).
I plan to revisit the BBI to petition them again to approve teeny, tiny signs for all their members. This time the signs should say, “Make me a comeback bird,” or “Don’t take me for granted,” or “Save my habitat.”
I think these are signs the BBI will heartily approve.
In the meantime, you can do your part as well. Plant trees and mow less lawn. Advocate for re-use of vacant buildings instead of building new ones (schools and strip malls come to mind immediately). Patronize small family farms where fields often have mixed habitats that are also great for birds. Reduce or eliminate the use of pesticides wherever you can, especially neonicotinoids or “neonics.” They kill birds and the insects that they eat.
To learn more about what you can personally do, log on to https://www.birds.cornell.edu/home/seven-simple-actions-to-help-birds/. If you have time, drop me a line and tell me about your efforts to save the birds. I would love to hear from you.