Holing Up For The Winter

Welcome to this week’s edition of Something Wild. I’m Rosemary Conroy for the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests.

Do you ever wonder where our birds go at night - especially in winter, when it's really cold? Obviously our local birds can handle subzero temperatures - after all, they do keep showing up at our bird feeders each morning. Those down coats they have on under their feathers work really well.

Plus, many of them conserve energy by slowing their metabolisms way down. Amazing a superpower as that is, most birds also take more mundane measures to survive those long winter nights.

For example, many seek out dense shrubs and conifers for protection, and some, like grouse, dive under the snow when it's deep enough to stay warm.

And then there are tree cavities, both the natural and man-made kind. Apparently the birds that use nest boxes to raise their young in the warmer months also use them as nighttime roosts in the winter. These include woodpeckers, chickadees, nuthatches, wrens, tufted titmice and yes, even bluebirds.

Birds of the same species often flock together, just like in the old saying. Apparently when it's really frigid the snuggling can often make the difference between rising and shining, or not. I witnessed this for the first time last month when I saw four bluebirds fly into our old purple martin house just before sunset. It was a bitterly cold night, but there they were the next morning, beautiful as ever.

It's been a bit strange to have these harbingers of spring around all winter long but it's getting to be pretty common. Obviously bluebirds know how to deal with the vagaries of our weather. Not that we can't help them out, of course. I used to wait until spring to clean out all my nest boxes, but now that I know that they may be used all winter long, I guess they'll get spruced up in the fall when the bird feeders go up!

Something Wild is a joint production of the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests, New Hampshire Audubon, and New Hampshire Public Radio.

For Something Wild, I’m Rosemary Conroy.