Interactions at the Feeder

So I'm sitting here 30 days into the 2019 government shutdown. During these weeks, I've spent a lot of time feeding and watching the birds in the backyard. I have a log feeder that I made, it is actually the second one after the first ended up splitting after several years, fill several holes with BarkButter. It is really popular with the birds and the other day I noticed a nice waiting line forming. Several birds would sit in the nearby buckeye tree or on the edge of our deck and wait their turn. Since the feeder hangs on a 6 foot long chain from a branch in a pine tree, it moves quite a lot. Either with the winds or when a larger bird lands on it. So, unlike the the tube feeder with safflower seed where every opening is often occupied, the log feeder tends to serve a single bird at a time. Or maybe it is different kinds of birds that frequent this feeder. (Another short study?)

Orange-crowned Warbler on log feeder before study started

I was intrigued by this behavior and having nothing else to occupy my mind, I decided that I would collect a little data. Not being a field ornithologist, I just made up a protocol for my data collection. I knew I wanted an ordered list of who visited the feeder, if anyone actively displaced another bird (or tried and failed), as well as who was waiting in line. For my first attempt I decided to record everyone waiting once a minute for a 15 minute block as well as the ordered list of who visited. This morning it was quite cold for here, 21 F, so there was a lot of activity. I made a little disturbance putting some water out in the frozen birdbath. So I waited a few minutes until activity returned.

While there was pretty constant activity there, it did lack the variety that I sometimes see there. In total, six species visited the feeder during my 15 minute sampling (Northern Mockingbird, Yellow-rumped Warbler, White-throated Sparrow, Carolina Wren, Downy Woodpecker, Carolina Chickadee). Four of those were seen waiting for the feed (not the Downy Woodpecker or Carolina Wren). The vast majority of feedings happened without any overt aggression (26/28). There was also one time where a White-throated Sparrow made multiple attempts to approach the feeder but never landed or took food.

Yellow-rumped Warbler taking food from the log feeder on the wing

There was an average (N=15) of 0.67 birds and median of 1 bird waiting at my count times. Only once were there multiple birds waiting (both a Northern Mockingbird and a Yellow-rumped Warbler) although at that time no one was actively feeding.

The best interactions were a White-throated Sparrow that tried multiple times to dislodge the Downy Woodpecker and failed. It would fly at the feeder and then turn away. There was also an unrecorded bird that dislodged the Mockingbird once.

I'm not sure I learned a whole lot but it was a fun experience and got me thinking about data a little while I'm not working. I did figure out that that it was way harder to collect the data than I was expecting. I need either a better shorthand or collect the data less frequently. But between writing, looking at the timer for the one-minute intervals and looking at the feeder I felt was was always behind and missing something.

Carolina Wren on the log feeder