Birders observe wider variety of birds at their feeders

Birders say they're seeing more finches, such as the redpoll, pine siskin and pine grosbeak, in New Brunswick.

"I looked out my window this morning and there were six pine siskins hanging on my sunflower seed feeder — three more down on the ground beneath picking up the seeds that fell," said David Christie.

Christie is a birder and naturalist. He said he's been seeing more of these finches for the past couple of weeks.

"We get these influxes from other places when the food supply is not as abundant as usual and that's what seems to be happening," he said.

Birds driven south

The birds typically can be seen in the area every couple of years. They're driven south from the boreal forest when the trees there don't produce enough seed.

"There are these short-term ups and downs and things which regulate the production of food for a lot of birds," Christie said.

Trees can be sporadic in producing viable seed, said wildlife biologist Bob Bancroft.

"Some years there just aren't very many seeds," he said. "So just in the same way that up north some years there aren't very many lemmings​ or mice and you wind up with hungry owls coming down, in a similar fashion if there isn't enough for the seed eaters they may just simply move down into another area where there are different types of seeds."

Boon to birders

It can happen if there is a particularly cold and wet spring, or an extra dry summer, or the trees themselves just don't have the energy to produce enough seeds.

But, for now, it's good news for birders.

"It means we will probably have more variety of our bird feeders this winter perhaps than we do on the average because there will be a good portion of those birds," Christie said.