November 23, 1989 - When Mother Nature's Kids Go Wild812 The Suffolk Times • November 23, 1989
When Mother Nature's Kids Go Wild.
By Paul Stoutenburah
There are so many times we are re-
warded if only we are patient. Our
neighbor down the road told me about a
strange and beautiful bird that he had
seen at his feeder. His description puz-
zled me for I thought I knew just about
every bird we had on the East End. It
had red, grey and white colorings with a
cardinal- shaped bill which put his bird
"out of the realm of our common feed-
ers.,'
It had to be an escaped bird, for noth-
ing fit the description he gave me. I re-
membered that in the back of one of my
bird books there was a section on ex-
otics that were continually cropping up
in the most outrageous places. Names
like Java sparrow, European goldfinch,
Chinese goose, golden pheasant and
others told of a long array of birds that
sharp -eyed observers had reported seeing
throughout the country. Alongside of
each was a drawing of an exotic bird
and, sure enough, there was a cardinal-
shaped bird with a scarlet head, white
breast and grey back. It's called the red -
crested cardinal (Brazilian cardinal).
Some time ago a number of people had
called me about seeing a mysterious red,
white and grey bird, but I never thought
it would wind up just down the road
from me. And here's where patience
comes in, as I mentioned in my
opening sentence.
Barbara has been keeping the feeders
well filled now that the mild weather
has passed, and when she does she
sprinkles some of it on the brick patio
for the ground feeders such as the white-
Focus on
Nature
throated sparrows that seem to be ev-
erywhere this year. These sparrows
spend their nesting season further north
than Long Island and return only to our
warmer climate during the winter
months. It doesn't take them long to
find a free handout. At times we see a
dozen or more scurrying about picking
up the seed. These, along with the
house finches and house sparrows,
chickadees, nuthatches, jays, doves and
others, create quite a bit of action out
on the patio.
Patience Pays Off
Our first real freeze came Saturday
night and put a coating of thin ice on
the bird bath. It brought a rufous -sided
towhee to the patio along with my
neighbor's Brazilian cardinal. Now,
we'd been trying to see this bird for
more than a week, but each time we
went over to Frank's house the bird had
left. Now it was practically under our
feet. Patience has its reward.
How did this bird from South Amer-
ica wind up on eastern Long Island? It's
hard to say, but probably it was a caged
bird that one day escaped or perhaps it
was deliberately let go as were the
house sparrows and starlings brought to
this rough and unkempt country for a
bit of nostalgia of the old country. The
problem of letting birds, or as a matter
of fact even animals, go wild in a
foreign land is that they usually have no
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BRAZILIAN CARDINAL —Those who feed birds are not only re-
warded by the joy of watching our native species but those who are pa-
tient often find exotics from other lands at their feeders.
predators to keep their numbers under
control. They invade the countryside,
taking over the wild habitat of the
native species. In some cases, but not
in all, these introduced flora and fauna
have decreased our native populations.
The common house mouse and Nor-
way rat are perfect examples of intruders
from overseas. The little rodents were
not let go on purpose here, but jumped
ship when they had the chance. Even to-
day the ships from overseas have huge
rat guards on their lines that hold the
ship to the dock to prevent these de-
structive creatures from coming ashore.
The rabbit that was introduced into Aus-
tralia and the deer to New Zealand are
perfect examples of introduced animals
out of control.
Starling Took Over
The introduced starling that is to be
found in every state in North America
has robbed the native birds' food and
homesteads. The starling is such an ag-
gressive bird that it will take over any
bird box or woodpecker's cavity it can
get into and the boxes he can't get into,
the house sparrow will. The starling's
appetite for food of almost any sort
brings him to the back yard, the farm-
ers' fields and even to the seashore to
feed. Once established it's almost im-
possible to ever reverse these invaders.
Even fish come into this introduced
category. Take for example the family
that buys Johnny a few goldfish for his
birthday. All goes well until one day
the water gets cloudy, no one cares to
take care of the goldfish and perhaps one
dies. So it is decided to set them free —
but where? "I know," says the worldly
father, "we'll put them in the lake." To
most that might sound like a plausible
solution, but to the professional ichthy-
ologist it spells disaster for the bass,
trout, pickerel or perch that were native
to the lake, for they will soon
disappear. The goldfish will soon
become established and eat the eggs of
the other fish and like the starling will
become the most common in the lake.
Of course, this does not always fol-
low that every exotic from another
shore will have the same success as the
starling and sparrow and others I've
mentioned. But there's enough evidence
to'show that there's been a definite
effect on our native wildlife by these
outside species.
A Special Place
To some this introducing of foreign
species into our native land is perfectly
all right, but I have a problem with it.
There should always be fine examples
of our native land; its forests, rivers,
lakes and seashore. There's something
special about this land of ours that
harbors such a wide variety of plants
and animals.
You might say, with tongue in
cheek, that our forefathers did the same
as the starling did to this unspoiled
wilderness when they came to America.
They took over the best land to raise
their food on and build their villages.
And like the starling, they pushed the
Indians off their native land and became
the dominant Homo sapiens. The world
is full of pluses and minuses and a few
question marks in between. The
Brazilian cardinal was a definite plus on
that cold, dark Saturday morning for it
brought a bright spot into our lives.
Whether he becomes a minus in the
future and pushes our native cardinal out
of our lives remains to be seen, which
leaves us with a question mark that
only time will answer.
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