These adorable redpolls spent the Winter in Chelsea and will soon be heading up north (way up north) for the Summer. Apparently they head “south” every second winter when the spruce and birch seeds are scarce.
This is so cool! I didn’t know this about redpolls. We participate in the Great Backyard Bird count every year. The data on their website clearly illustrates the pattern you describe. If you go to http://gbbc.birdsource.org/gbbcApps/maproom, choose Common Redpoll and and the North Atlantic region. Then click on display map to see this year’s data. On the left menu you’ll see an option for multi-year animation. You clearly see the local counts going up and down every other year. 2005 and 2009 seem to be anomolies. I guess the seeds were sparse for some weather reason those years. The counts… Read more »
I only know this because my brother and his wife gave me a wonderful bird book for Christmas. It’s “Birds of Canada ” by David M. BIRD (really). It’s a 400 page book and each bird gets a full page of detailed information. It’s a delight!
This is so cool! I didn’t know this about redpolls. We participate in the Great Backyard Bird count every year. The data on their website clearly illustrates the pattern you describe. If you go to http://gbbc.birdsource.org/gbbcApps/maproom, choose Common Redpoll and and the North Atlantic region. Then click on display map to see this year’s data. On the left menu you’ll see an option for multi-year animation. You clearly see the local counts going up and down every other year. 2005 and 2009 seem to be anomolies. I guess the seeds were sparse for some weather reason those years. The counts… Read more »
I only know this because my brother and his wife gave me a wonderful bird book for Christmas. It’s “Birds of Canada ” by David M. BIRD (really). It’s a 400 page book and each bird gets a full page of detailed information. It’s a delight!
Thanks! I’ll request it for my birthday. 🙂