Pickin's are slim in the forest these days. Unlike humans, wild animals can't go to the local grocery store. They can, however, show up at your birdfeeders. Avoid endangering the lives of bears by taking in your bird feeder until December.
Something Wild: Hold Those Feeders!
Air date: November 7, 2003
Welcome to this week’s edition of Something Wild. I’m Rosemary Conroy for the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests.
Don’t you hate it when you are cooking and find that you are out of a key ingredient? Luckily, we can just pop over to our local supermarket.
For wildlife, however, it’s not so easy. They depend upon wild foods being available at the right time. Most of the time this works out pretty well but sometimes, the system fails. For example, in many parts of the state, oak and beech trees seem to be taking this year off. Unfortunately, many animals depend upon acorns and beechnuts to fatten up for winter.
Consequently, deer, turkeys, and black bears are roaming far and wide to look for alternate sources of food this autumn.
And black bears, being the very clever animals that they are, often come snooping around our houses to see what may be available. And they have very good memories.
So, if you were visited by a hungry black bear last spring, don’t be surprised if that pesky old bruin decides to pop back over this fall. In fact, you can pretty much count on it. That’s why the folks at the New Hampshire Fish & Game Department are urging you to not hang up your bird feeders until at least mid-December.
By then, the really cold weather will have set in and most black bears will gone to sleep for the winter. And, as we have mentioned before, birds can do quite fine without our handouts, especially at this time of year.
Besides, replacing bear-damaged bird feeders is expensive — for us and them. While we shell out only money, a bear-turned-nuisance-animal often pays with its life.
So don’t teach bears that humans equal food. Hold off on feeding the birds until the real cold weather begins. And thanks.
Something Wild is a joint production of the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests, NHPR, and the Audubon Society of New Hampshire.
For Something Wild, I’m Rosemary Conroy.
