Urban Nature Pictures 5/19
May. 19th, 2010 07:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
It's dead baby bird season.

This was a fledgling starling. Some bird ate much of it in a tree, then dropped it onto a picnic table.
This time of year there are baby starlings everywhere. They drown in the water features, bash into exhibits' glass walls, and meet various other ends. Mortality in young songbirds is about 70%. People try to save baby birds all the time, but nature plans for most of them to die. Otherwise birds would only lay two eggs, and die when they reached adulthood. And of course, starlings shouldn't be here at all...

This was a fledgling starling. Some bird ate much of it in a tree, then dropped it onto a picnic table.
This time of year there are baby starlings everywhere. They drown in the water features, bash into exhibits' glass walls, and meet various other ends. Mortality in young songbirds is about 70%. People try to save baby birds all the time, but nature plans for most of them to die. Otherwise birds would only lay two eggs, and die when they reached adulthood. And of course, starlings shouldn't be here at all...