It is not a coincidence that the birds featured in this post are on a rotting stump in our yard. We leave stumps & snags – when safe – for the very reasons tree removal companies tell us not to: To attract ‘pests’. Pests like the wasps, beetles, spiders, ants and caterpillars that live in and eat dead wood & become important food sources for birds.
Stumps and snags also play a critical role in the resources available to residents and visitors to our yards. Stumps, snags, and debris are all natural occurrences in the forests and woodlands in which the birds evolved. But, in manicuring our yards, they are the first to go.
The absence of natural resources is particularly important during spring migration because the partial migratory birds that spent the winter with us need to gain a lot of weight in order to successfully make it to the breeding grounds & successfully mate. Long-distance migrants need these resources to rapidly replenish the weight loss from nights flying long distances. This pre-migratory and on the journey fattening is more than just laying on the calories. The makeup of the diet is import. The abundance and mix of protein affect hormonal, metabolic, & other physiological changes that have evolved to successfully deal with the stresses of traveling and breeding. These changes not only enable the gain, they are critically important for maintaining overall health & body system functions during this rapid gain & then rapid loss in a matter of weeks. Think about the impact on our body systems if we replicated this mass gain & loss.
For the non-migratory & summer residents: “stumps, standing dead trees, or snags, can double as nurseries for more than 80 types of cavity-nesting birds in North America, including 10 species of owls, two species of falcons, all 21 species of woodpeckers and about 40 types of songbirds, according to the Cavity Conservation Initiative in Orange County, Calif., which promotes the safe retention of dead and dying trees.”
Many species desperately need these natural resources in the landscape. For example, White-throated Sparrows need more of this micro-habitat in their wintering grounds & for stopovers along their migration routes to help stem their annual population declines of .74%\year. 33% total since the mid-1960s.
And birds are not the only species that loves stumps.
