Learn how growing native plants helps birds feed their families in this online talk by Charley Winterbauer, past President of Cape Fear Audubon and current Co-chair of the SE Coastal chapter of the NC Native Plant Society.
As most everyone that has a concern for birds knows from Doug Tallamy, the insects are necessary for the livelihood of young birds. Ever since Doug’s book, Bringing Nature Home, came out in 2007, there has been a growing effort to promote native plants to restore the original ecosystem which helps birds survive.
In that book, Doug Tallamy cites a numerical example of the Chickadee’s need for insects. Specifically, he states that the Chickadee needs 4,800 insects to fledge the birds in the nest. In more recent times, that number has been increased to the range of 6,000 to 9,000. Of course, we can’t state the number exactly for any given nest. It has been suggested that the bird may decide how many eggs to lay based on its intuition on how much food (insects) may be available to raise the young. Or, not at all because it concludes there isn’t enough food to raise the young.
As we know, there are quite a few backyard birds that depend upon the availability of insect to raise their young. The presentation, “The Importance Of Natives for Birds”, makes an educated assumption on the number of insects needed to successfully raise a majority of those backyard birds. While the assumption may not be exact, it does at least lead to an approximate number required to have those birds successfully propagate. If the resulting number is anywhere near correct, it is an astounding number needed. Those insects must come from native plants and that means we need a lot of natives available.
