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I'm no expert about anything...but is it a good idea to give bread to wild birds? I know bread isn't good for geese.
It is not. Bird feeder, squirrel tables etc are discouraged by wildlife experts because it make wild animals over reliant on humans for food and diminished their foraging, scavenging and hunting skills.
"Hartup, who also studies conjunctivitis in house finches, says wild birds frequently carry one or more forms of salmonella without becoming ill --"
Finding Salmonella in a dead bird is like finding E.coli on a rectal swab taken from a human shot in the head and declaring he died from E.coli.
It most definitely is a problem in Pine Siskins in the Pacific Northwest, where I live. They are very susceptible to it, and it has caused mass die-offs. It is spread readily at bird feeders because most people don't sterilize them frequently enough. When we have serious problems with it, local Audubon societies discourage bird feeders.
It most definitely is a problem in Pine Siskins in the Pacific Northwest, where I live. They are very susceptible to it, and it has caused mass die-offs. It is spread readily at bird feeders because most people don't sterilize them frequently enough. When we have serious problems with it, local Audubon societies discourage bird feeders.
Salmonellosis is diagnosed in humans by culturing Salmonella from blood &/or stool samples--Humans don't ordinarily have Salmonella in those samples....
How do these "experts" diagnose it in birds that do ordinarily have it in their GI tracts & on their skin & feathers?
I may be wrong, but it sounds more likely to be a correlation report and not a diagnosis. Please provide us with some actual research studies stating methods and findings, and not propaganda from fund raising organizations.
Natural populations fluctuate. Factors influencing that include habitat changes and coincidental changes in relationships with food species as well as pathogen species, and in the specific characteristics of birth & death rates....The 17 yr cicada irruption is the classic, extreme example of population fluctuation. For most species, no "explanation" is necessary except to say that the obligatory population curve is inherent in the math.
Quick, qualitative summary of "The Math"-- The N-K Population Model involves the death rate, the birth rate and factors determined by competition input. Each is further modified by a constant term. By properly selecting each of those terms, a graph of any shape & size can be generated ,including that of the 17-year cicada....One can then "curve fit" the math to fit the observations in Nature without knowing the precise "reasons" behind the values. ...
My point here is that the Pine Siskin may show periodic Irruptions and die offs without any need for special explanations like disease outbreaks.
More propaganda with no scientific evidence.-- they are assuming increasing bird deaths are from Salmonella.
Ask yourself-- if Salmonella is commonly a colonial in these birds, why does it suddenly become a problem?...How many siskinds feed at backyard feeders compared to the over all population? Enough to cause an epidemic? ...Don't these birds ever flock together at any sights bedsides birdfeeders?...Why aren't other birds that feed there affected?...Are there any population studies over an extended time period that suggest this is not just normal, cyclic fluctuation of populations?
Plenty of room for skepticism on this one. Don't believe everything you read from organizations that are begging for handouts....and certainly don't form any opinions on this until you are conversant with the math of population dynamics
edited to add: Don't confuse a return to normal, lower pop numbers following an irruption of numbers with a "die off." Pine siskins are apparently prone to this phenomenon. https://loudounwildlife.org/2007/01/...-of-migration/
And by training wild birds to come to your fruit trees to get fed, you guarantee that they will strip your fruit trees before the fruit even gets all the way ripe.
Yes this the point and sure these will be the consequences. Growing fruits for the birds.
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