Wild bird feeding (probably) affects avian urban ecology

Amrhein, Valentin

doi:10.1093/acprof:osobl/9780199661572.003.0003

Cited by 30 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 52 publications

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“…Rather than establishing lines of investigation in countries where bird feeding is not wellestablished, we suggest that such research should be carried out in countries where many households are engaged in bird feeding activities. All of the research questions raised require sustained engagement with the bird feeding public who we feel would be readily recruited to citizen science programs to provide banding capacity, food supplements at urban feeders, and feeder monitoring Amrhein, 2014).…”

Section: Concluding Remarks: What Needs To Be Done To Answer These Rementioning

confidence: 99%

Garden Bird Feeding: Insights and Prospects from a North-South Comparison of This Global Urban Phenomenon

et al. 2017

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Intentional feeding of wild birds in gardens or backyards is one of the most popular forms of human-wildlife interactions in the developed world, especially in urban environments. The scale and intensity of bird feeding are enormous with mainly birdseed consumed daily by a range of species. This represents a subsidy to natural diets of birds attracted to the feeders and typically involves novel dietary components. Yet, relatively little is known about how it influences the behavior and ecology of the species visiting feeders. In part, research has been hampered by logistical difficulties of working in urban areas but studies have demonstrated powerful influences on behavior and phenology of avian breeding, the spread of disease, and the structure of avian communities. Here, we compare bird feeding between Northern and Southern Hemispheres as a means of exploring how similarities and differences in avian responses might inform knowledge of this global urban phenomenon. We start by tracing its origins to north-western Europe and how its expansion has occurred before considering how geographical differences in feeding practices and attitudes map onto bird feeding "on the ground." We explore some of the major emerging themes of recent interest, including why citizens are motivated to feed birds, whether birds become fully dependent on food supplements, the role of feeding in avian disease transmission, and how feeding changes urban bird communities. By proposing that scientists work in collaboration with the public providing food to birds, we pose key research questions that need to be answered urgently and suggest accompanying experimental approaches to do so. These approaches are essential if we are to improve our understanding of how bird feeding shapes the behavior, ecology, movements, and community structure of urban birds. Our hope is that through such citizen science we will be able to provide advice as to location-relevant practices that should maximize benefits to both urban biodiversity and human well-being, and minimize potential adverse impacts. We demonstrate that bird feeding is important for urban biodiversity conservation, community engagement, and in establishing personal connections with nature and their associated benefits.

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Section: Concluding Remarks: What Needs To Be Done To Answer These Rementioning

confidence: 99%

Garden Bird Feeding: Insights and Prospects from a North-South Comparison of This Global Urban Phenomenon

et al. 2017

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“…Among other impacts, individuals that heavily rely on supplementary food may have altered body condition, reproductive success, home range size, and/or survival likelihood (Annett and Pierotti, 1999;Oro et al, 2013). The collective impacts of supplementary feeding on individuals determines the overall effect on population dynamics, including changes in population size, distribution, and migratory patterns (Robb et al, 2008;Oro et al, 2013;Amrhein, 2014), and will depend on both the proportion of the population using feeders and individual heterogeneity in feeder use, particularly where feeder users are a nonrandom subset of the population (Sanz-Aguilar et al, 2015). Furthermore, individuals which follow a high-use, consistent foraging strategy at feeders are more likely to pose a disease risk than sporadic users, as exposure to pathogens and parasites increases as feeder visitation increases (Adelman et al, 2015).…”

Section: Individual Variabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Effectively a massive ecosystem-scale intervention, bird feeding has numerous potential implications for the biology and ecology of feeder-visiting birds (Jones, 2011), as well as the wider faunal community (e.g., Bonnington et al, 2014;Orros et al, 2015). Although studies of bird-feeding impacts in urban habitats are rare, there is mounting evidence to confirm that garden bird feeding can be profoundly influential for urban-dwelling bird communities (Amrhein, 2014). For example, feeding can alter body condition, reproductive outputs, adult survival, disease dynamics, community assemblages, and migration (Robb et al, 2008;Jokimäki and Kaisanlahti-Jokimäki, 2012;Galbraith et al, 2015Galbraith et al, , 2017Orros and Fellowes, 2015a;Plummer et al, 2015;Wilcoxen et al, 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Urban Bird Feeders Dominated by a Few Species and Individuals

et al. 2017

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The practice of garden bird feeding is a global phenomenon, involving millions of people and vast quantities of food annually. Many people engage in the practice of feeding assuming that birds gain some benefit from the food they provide, yet recent studies have revealed the potential for detrimental impacts as well. However, there is still a paucity of information on the impacts of feeding, including the ubiquity of these impacts among and within feeder-visiting species. Consistency in feeder use among birds is likely an important determinant of this. Individual birds and species that make frequent use of feeders are more likely to experience both the benefits and detrimental impacts of supplementary food. We investigated patterns of feeder use by garden birds visiting experimental feeding stations in Auckland, New Zealand, with the specific aim of determining whether use of supplementary food was consistent or variable among individuals and species. We used camera traps as well as Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology to examine intra-and interspecific feeder visitation patterns and to discern species associations. Eleven bird species were detected using feeding stations, however, two introduced species (house sparrow Passer domesticus and spotted dove Streptopelia chinensis) dominated visitation events. These species were present at feeders most frequently, with the largest conspecific group sizes. Significant associations were detected among a number of species, suggesting interspecific interactions are important in determining feeder use. We also found within-species differences in feeder use for all focal species, with individual variation greatest in house sparrows. Furthermore, season had an important influence on most visitation parameters. The observed individual and species-specific differences in supplementary food resource use imply that the impacts of garden bird feeding are not universal. Crucially, particularly given the avifaunal context in New Zealand, resource dominance by introduced species could have potential negative outcomes for native species conservation in cities.

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“… 1 References: Lack 1954, Perrins 1965, Cowie and Hinsley 1988, Chace and Walsh 2006, Leston and Rodewald 2006, Isaksson and Andersson 2007, Marciniak and Nadolski 2007, Robb et al 2008a,2008ab, Chamberlain et al 2009, Harrison et al 2010, Amrhein , Deviche and Davies 2014, Mackenzie et al 2014, Glądalski et al 2015, Wawrzyniak et al 2015.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Urbanisation lowers great titParus majorbreeding success at multiple spatial scales

Satgé

Strubbe

Elst

et al. 2019

Journal of Avian Biology

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While numerous studies have reported negative effects of urbanisation on birds, few have examined the role of urban scale in influencing breeding success. Furthermore, many studies have relied on qualitative rather than quantitative assessments of urbanisation. This study sought to address these issues by testing the effects of urbanisation, measured at two spatial scales, on the breeding success of great tits Parus major. A nested study design, incorporating over 400 nestboxes, was used in study sites across northern Belgium with a priori quantified degrees of urbanisation at both local and regional scales. All measured breeding parameters were found to vary at one or both spatial scales of urbanisation; in more urbanised areas great tits displayed advanced laying dates but lower breeding success compared to rural areas, with smaller clutch sizes, lower nestling masses and fewer fledglings per egg. Importantly, urbanisation effects were not limited to big cities as birds breeding in gardens or parks in small towns also had comparatively low success. We found that both regional‐ and local‐scale urbanisation had consistent significant effects on laying date, clutch size and nestling mass, while the number of fledglings per egg was negatively influenced by local‐scale urbanisation only. Results of this study therefore highlight the importance of utilising multiple spatial scales in analysing urbanisation effects, as well as the potential negative impact of local urbanisation on breeding success. This calls for further investigation into mechanisms driving urbanisation effects and how these may vary at different scales.

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Wild bird feeding (probably) affects avian urban ecology

Cited by 30 publications

References 52 publications

Garden Bird Feeding: Insights and Prospects from a North-South Comparison of This Global Urban Phenomenon

Garden Bird Feeding: Insights and Prospects from a North-South Comparison of This Global Urban Phenomenon

Urban Bird Feeders Dominated by a Few Species and Individuals

Urbanisation lowers great titParus majorbreeding success at multiple spatial scales

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