Chickadees are hardy birds for Minnesota climate

By Bev Johnson | The Daily Journal

Published Saturday, January 5, 2008

Now that Uncle Phil has all the equipment for bird feeding, maybe he would like a little information on what birds to expect at his feeders.

The most common bird we feed is the black-capped chickadee. This little powerhouse only weighs about an ounce, but don't call her a birdbrain. She can remember hundreds, if not thousands, of food storage places.

(Do you ever wonder who does this kind of counting? And how does he know if it is the same bird? Even with a band on a leg, that is a very common bird and small enough to easily miss.)

So how does this bit of fluff and feathers survive our nasty, cold winters? Birds have a higher metabolic rate, body temperature and blood pressure than mammals, and the smaller the bird, the higher.

A small creature loses body heat at a faster rate, than a larger one. They need a tremendous amount of calories to stay alive and warm. In the winter, if the temperature is above zero, the chickadee will need the equivalent of about 150 black sunflower seeds a day. When it drops below zero, she will need 250.

Winter days are short and birds don't feed in the dark, so she is a very busy bird on cold days. If she has access to a lot of food, she will store extra energy as fat to be burned when she needs it. She also hides extra food, one of her specialties. In the winter, half her diet will be seeds and berries and the other half will be suet, spiders and other insects she finds in cracks and crevices in tree bark or your cedar siding.

If she finds a dead mammal, she will eat the fat from that too, thus speeding natural recycling. She won't eat the meat, as you will find, if you feed suet with a bit of flesh on it. None of the small birds will eat meat.

You may have noticed that birds fluff up in cold to trap body heat.

Well chickadees go that one better. She can lower her body temperature at will cutting her energy requirements during the night. A communal winter birdhouse, where many birds rest at night, will help keep all of them warm. We have plans for such a house at the Extension Office.

Birders call black oil sunflower seeds the hamburger of the bird world. Almost all the birds at the feeder will eat them.

Chickadees usually live about 30 months. Studies have shown that if they have access to black sunny seeds that can double. Shells of black sunny seeds are very thin, so not only do they have a high meat-to-shell ratio, the shells are easy for the birds to crack.

(This information is from an article in the Minneapolis Tribune, written by Jim Williams, a member of the U.S. National Refuge Birding Initiative Committee, and several other associations.)

Bev Johnson is a master gardener for West Otter Tail County.