Others, like jays, cache food for later consumption.Įating during a harsh winter can become a delicate balancing act. Some species, like the European robin, guard a winter territory to ensure their food supply. Besides, birds that don’t migrate can occupy and defend the best territories. Migration is hazardous and uses energy that could otherwise be used to raise a brood. Most birds that eat fruit or insects must move towards the equator to find enough food to survive while many birds that rely on seeds can overwinter. However, unlike hibernation, torpor isn’t confined to winter, and smaller birds – which carry less fat reserves – are more likely to enter torpor at any time of year.Ĭontrary to popular belief, birds migrate to find food, not to escape the cold of winter. A torpid Anna’s hummingbird consumes up to 50 times less energy than it does when it is awake.īirds are more likely to enter torpor when food is scarce and they need to conserve energy. ![]() Other bird species, like hummingbirds and doves, sometimes enter a state of torpor in which their body temperature falls by as much as 30 ☌. A nocturnal insectivore, it would starve if it didn’t migrate or hibernate. ![]() ![]() It is native to western areas of Canada and the US and to northern Mexico. The common poorwill, a North American nightjar, hibernates when its food disappears. Their name for the bird is holchko, which means “the sleeping one”. But the Indigenous Hopi people had long known about poorwills’ winter habit. This was described by scientists in 1946 when an individual was found in a Californian cave with a body temperature of 5☌.
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