Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!dptg!att!cbnewsk!king
From: king@cbnewsk.ATT.COM (joyce.l.king)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: Re: bird begging
Summary: subsidized great white herons
Keywords: begging
Message-ID: <820@cbnewsk.ATT.COM>
Date: 10 Aug 89 13:05:52 GMT
References: <4529@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu>
Distribution: usa
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Lines: 30


I have just finished writing a layman's version of a study Audubon
research biologists carried out in Florida Bay.  They marked with large wing 
tags the great white herons that begged at docks and canalside homes (the
"subsidized" birds).  Then they did a 3-year study on those nests and the
nests of birds that fed entirely on what they found in the Bay.  The
conclusions were pretty startling...subsidized birds were much more
successful nesters.  In fact, the other birds were not able to produce
enough offspring to uphold the population.  So, with a species that numbers
only about 2500 individuals, we conclude that feeding is the only way to
save the species.

But they also feel that we are producing a subsidized population by skewing the
gene pool.  Well, we've talked about that before.  Damned if we do and damned if
we don't.

We had to take a stand, so I wrote articles for the local newspapers telling
what and how to feed.  So we end up with pet herons.  I guess it's better than
no herons at all.

The fault, you see, lies in habitat.  Florida Bay suffers from mismanagement
of the Everglades.  If there's enough food in the Bay the heron won't beg.  I
bet habitat loss is part of the problem in the original posting, even though
they are talking about finches and cardinals.  The successful birds are those
that can adjust to the new world of pollution and loss of habitat.  The others
are simply not going to make it.

Gosh, that's a depressing way to start the day.  

Joyce Andrews King (Florida Keys, by way of modern communications)