Wingin’ It: Feeding the birds of winter

As winter approaches and bears go into hibernation, many people resume feeding the birds. We feed mainly sunflower hearts, suet blocks, and “Zick dough.”

Birds enjoy the heated birdbath that provides water when temperatures make other sources freeze. (Photos by David Durrant)

Sunflower hearts leave no husks to clean up but are more expensive than black oil sunflower seed or generic seed mixes. Sunflower hearts attract chickadees, tufted titmice, woodpeckers, nuthatches, juncos, and finches, among others. The few seeds that fall to ground attract ground feeders such as juncos, bluejays, cardinals, mourning doves, and several species of sparrows.

Suet blocks attract mainly hairy and downy woodpeckers and red-bellied woodpeckers, but many of the birds feasting on sunflower hearts also have a go at the suet.

Zick dough (see Resources, below) is a peanut butter, lard, flour, cornmeal, and chick starter concoction we feed the bluebirds in a custom feeder David designed and built. (See  “Wingin’ It,” Friday, March 30, 2007, for feeder and nest box details; search for “Wingin’ It” and go the the last page of results) Woodpeckers, nuthatches, and titmice are sometimes able to sneak into the bluebird feeder. Larger birds like blue jays and starlings cannot get in to access the food.

Our neighbors Bill and Lin dropped by with a tub of Bill’s birdacious bark butter. I suspect the bark butter is similar to Zick dough as a high energy treat for the birds. It was very nice of them and we will give it a try. Before we started making the dough, we bought mealworms to feed the bluebirds. Pam was not a fan of mealworms in the refrigerator, so the switch to Zick was much appreciated.

Water is important in winter as natural water resources freeze. We have a heated birdbath that David rigged up. A simpler solution would be to buy a heated dog bowl and put a rock in it for birds to perch on.

We have had fewer common birds visit this fall. A flock of 40 to 60 cedar waxwings continues to wing by, eating the fruit of the Korean mountain ash. A pair of hooded mergansers dropped into the pond for a few days for a final goodbye. One afternoon, sitting on our terrace visiting with our new neighbors, David noticed movement on the trunk of the oak tree; it was a brown creeper working his way up the tree, probing the bark for insects. Nuthatches have similar behavior but are larger, have different markings, and usually go down the tree head first.

On Sunday David saw a small gray bird with a sharp pointed beak. Kinglet came immediately to mind. It flitted away before he could identify whether it was a golden-crowned or ruby-crowned kinglet. Kinglets have a distinctive thin high call and are smaller than chickadees. They breed in the far north and winter in North America, including locally.

This home-built bird feeder provides a sturdy roof for shelter during storms. 

This winter is not expected to be an irruptive year in which northern-wintering species move to the south due to low food availability, according to Tyler Hoar, a freelance biologist and ecologist from Canada, who has predicted such things for years. Irruptions refer to the movement of northern-wintering species to the south in years of low food availability

Even so we will still be on the lookout for grosbeaks, redpolls, purple finches, and other northern neighbors who may come south. There have already been reports of at least one snowy owl at Parker River Wildlife Refuge. We will make a trip up there to see them and whatever other birds might be there—we are lucky to have this “Important Bird Area,” as designated by the National Audubon Society, so close to home.

For reports of uncommon bird sightings, go to the Bird Sightings column in the metro section of The Sunday Globe. The bird sightings are based on reports to Mass. Audubon and listed by county. Recent columns noted a sandhill crane at Dexter Drumlin in Lancaster. We, of course, made the short trek out to Lancaster and up to the top of the drumlin for the view down to the Nashua River lowlands and the sandhill cranes. Though clearly visible through binoculars, our scope greatly enhanced the view.

Another source for bird reports is the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s ebird app. To get a list of birds that have been reported in our area, go to the ebird app and click on “explore” for nearby hotspots. You will see a map with locations to click on and get a list of birds that have been reported in that location. You will probably not see everything reported, but it gives you a good idea of what to look for.

Don’t forget the birds this holiday giving season. Bird lovers may consider:

• A membership in Mass. Audubon, Cornell Lab of Ornithology, the Harvard Conservation Trust, or other conservation organizations.
• A subscription to Bird Watcher’s Digest, Bird Watching, and Cornell’s Living Bird (which comes with a membership to the lab), birding magazines we enjoy.
• A field guide. David Sibley’s “Field Guide to the Birds of Eastern North America,” is our go-to guide for this country, but there are many more to choose from. Pam uses Merlin Bird ID and iBird Pro on her iPhone for a comprehensive guide.
• A bird feeder or bird seed. We get our seed from Erikson Grain Mill in South Acton which is a local family-owned (since 1942!) store carrying a wide range of grains, seeds, and feeders.
• For the more creative, a handmade bird feeder is always appreciated, and there are many ideas one can glean from the web. A simple one is to take an approximately 2-inch-diameter branch about 12 to 15 inches long, drill a number of 1-inch holes in it, and press Zick dough, Bill’s birdacious bark butter, or peanut butter into the holes. Hang it from a tree branch with a cup hook and string. If you are a little more creative. you could build a platform feeder for ground-feeding birds. The photo here is of one David built for us.

Resources

• Parker River National Wildlife Reserve: www.fws.gov/refuge/parker_river/
• Zick dough recipe: juliezickefoose.blogspot.com/2010/03/zick-dough-improved.html
• Finch forecast: finchnetwork.org/winter-finch-forecast-2021-2022-by-tyler-hoar
• Cornell Lab of Ornithology: www.birds.cornell.edu/home/
• Mass. Audubon: www.massaudubon.org/get-involved/membership
• Harvard Conservation Trust: harvardconservationtrust.org
• Bird Watcher’s Digest: www.birdwatchersdigest.com/bwdsite/
• Bird Watching: www.birdwatchingdaily.com/
• Erikson Grain Mill: www.eriksongrain millinc.com
• Dexter Drumlin: https://thetrustees.org/content/before-setting-out

Pam and David Durrant live and work at Micheldever Farm on East Bare Hill Road

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