• picture
  • picture
  • picture
  • picture
Public Radio's Environmental News Magazine (follow us on Google News)

BirdNote ®- Winter Birds Love Suet

Air Date: Week of

In winter there are few bugs for hungry birds to eat so they flock to back yard suet feeders. BirdNote®'s Mary McCann reports.



Transcript

CURWOOD: Now perhaps at this time of year, you're contemplating cutting back on those rich fatty foods after all the holiday festivities. But that's not for the birds! Here's Mary McCann with today's Birdnote®.

MCCANN: At this time of year, birds love fat! With a brilliant flash of its copper-red underwings, a Flicker sails into the yard.

[SOUND: NORTHERN FLICKER’S “KEEYR”]

MCCANN: Just behind it wings a stubby-tailed Red-breasted Nuthatch:

[SOUND: RED-BREASTED NUTHATCH’S “YANK-YANK-YANK”]

MCCANN: Now a couple of energetic Black-capped Chickadees dart in


Chestnut-backed Chickadee (Photo: © Mike Hamilton)

[SOUND: SHORT BURST OF “DEE-DEE-DEE” NOTES]

MCCANN: …And a Downy Woodpecker brings up the rear.

[SOUND: DOWNY WOODPECKER CALL]

MCCANN: What’s the attraction? A cake of suet, suspended from a branch in a small wire feeder. Suet is beef fat, a high-energy food critical for birds’ survival in the colder months. With few insects available in winter, suet is an especially strong magnet for birds that eat a lot of bugs in the warmer months. It’s also great for birds with bills that are not adapted to opening seeds.

Bird feeding suppliers now offer a wide array of processed suet cakes, some studded with berries or seeds. Perhaps a bird’s equivalent of a home-baked chocolate chip cookie.

[SOUND: RED-BREASTED NUTHATCH’S “YANK-YANK-YANK”]


Red-breasted Nuthatch (Photo: © Mike Hamilton)

MCCANN: I’m Mary McCann.

CURWOOD: There are pictures of these winter birds feasting on yummy suet-cakes over at our website - LOE dot org.




Written by Bob Sundstrom
Bird audio provided by The Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Northern Flicker recorded by W.W.H. Gunn. Red-breasted Nuthatch call recorded by W.L. Hershberger. Black-capped Chickadee call by S.R. Pantle, call of a Steller’s Jay by G.A. Keller, and Downy Woodpecker [62757] call by W.W.H. Gunn.
Producer: John Kessler
Executive Producer: Chris Peterson
© 2012 Tune In to Nature.org November 2012 Narrator: Mary McCann

 

Links

BirdNote®

 

Living on Earth wants to hear from you!

Living on Earth
62 Calef Highway, Suite 212
Lee, NH 03861
Telephone: 617-287-4121
E-mail: comments@loe.org

Newsletter [Click here]

Donate to Living on Earth!
Living on Earth is an independent media program and relies entirely on contributions from listeners and institutions supporting public service. Please donate now to preserve an independent environmental voice.

Newsletter
Living on Earth offers a weekly delivery of the show's rundown to your mailbox. Sign up for our newsletter today!

Sailors For The Sea: Be the change you want to sea.

The Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment: Committed to protecting and improving the health of the global environment.

Contribute to Living on Earth and receive, as our gift to you, an archival print of one of Mark Seth Lender's extraordinary wildlife photographs. Follow the link to see Mark's current collection of photographs.

Buy a signed copy of Mark Seth Lender's book Smeagull the Seagull & support Living on Earth