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Does feeding garden birds do more harm than good?

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Does feeding garden birds do more harm than good?

#51

Post by foxhop »

AussieWog93 wrote: post #35
11235813213455 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Garlic is the plant necessary in everyday life from the past until the present days. It contains active compounds that are responsible for its effect on almost every part of the human body. Garlic is an excellent tonic for the human organism. It has been used for medical treatment of everything, from ancient civilizations to date > From all of the above-mentioned data, it can be concluded that administration of gar…

Please read your own quote back to yourself. Does it make any hard, falsifiable claims (e.g. "eating one clove of garlic daily reduces the probability of catching a cold by 26%")? Does it make any prescriptive recommendations at all (at least to people that are not hyperlypemic)? Does it even sound remotely at all like hard science? Regardless of the validity of the health claims, does this mean people should actuall…

You had me at every until saying garlic is repulsive. Shots fired, I grown garlic but I most often consume it fried in olive oil to pull out compounds into the oils for flavor.

Another way one is fermented with hot peppers to make hot sauce. Just a little bit of garlic goes a long way.

One hint, always remove or discard the green "germ" or kernel of the garlic before using in food prep. The nasty garlic flavor comes from there.

Planting and growing garlic is easy and for northerners we plant in the Autumn. Video related:

https://youtu.be/GUYrN0o-cfk

Re: Does feeding garden birds do more harm than good?

#53

Post by mattkrause »

lucb1e wrote: post #20
cmsefton wrote: post #2

The paper mentioned in the article, Killing with kindness: Does widespread generalised provisioning of wildlife help or hinder biodiversity conservation efforts?, can be found here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00063...

> can be found here For the low price of only $35.95! Not even sure it contains much. The abstract says (replacing some needlessly obscure words because not everyone's native language is english): > Direct effects upon [fed animals] have garnered most research interest, and are generally positive in leading to increased survival, productivity and hence population growth. However, we argue that the wider implications…

FWIW, virtually nobody pays the sticker price for a single article. Many researchers have some kind of institutional access (e.g., through a library).

If you don’t, shoot one of the authors an email and ask for a copy. Not only will they certainly send you one—-they don’t see a penny of that money—-but you’ll also make some harried grad student’s day.

Re: Does feeding garden birds do more harm than good?

#54

Post by stinos »

Causality1 wrote: post #28

One aspect not addressed is that birds using feeders are at increased risk of being killed by pet cats. Could this be offsetting the greater food supply?

I don't think that is a generalisation which can easily be made. Many factors in play as well, e.g. imagine the situation where the birds normally have to be at about ground level to pick seeds, and one hangs a feeder on a washing line. The latter cannot be reached by cats, in the former situation the casts just have to wait for their possible meal to arrive. At the same time seeds drop from the feeder so birds going for that are an easier target for cats. But that's back to square one, so might not total to increased risk.

Re: Does feeding garden birds do more harm than good?

#55

Post by aw1621107 »

11235813213455 wrote: post #46
rhn_mk1 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't been able to find any reputable sources about your claim "we can produce it naturally", which sets off my bullshit detector for your entire claim. You might be more successful if you support what you say with sources.

> It (B12) is synthesized by some bacteria in the gut flora in humans and other animals https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_B12#:~:text=It%20is%20... so yea not directly by us, but by our guts flora, you validate it?

The rest of the sentence provides some important information:

> It is synthesized by some bacteria in the gut flora in humans and other animals, but it has long been thought that humans cannot absorb this as it is made in the colon, downstream from the small intestine, where the absorption of most nutrients occurs.

Re: Does feeding garden birds do more harm than good?

#56

Post by greenhatman »

christophilus wrote: post #19

An alternative narrative: if feeders favor dominant/ bully birds, it might help the less dominant ones by freeing up just about every other spot in the area. If you knew the high school bullies were hanging out in the gym 90% of the time, the gym is actually helping you avoid the bullies (assuming you don’t have to go to the gym).

The bullies tend to be loud and annoying. So I'd personally prefer not to have them in my yard. Geese are the worst.

Re: Does feeding garden birds do more harm than good?

#57

Post by OJFord »

mattkrause wrote: post #53
lucb1e wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> can be found here For the low price of only $35.95! Not even sure it contains much. The abstract says (replacing some needlessly obscure words because not everyone's native language is english): > Direct effects upon [fed animals] have garnered most research interest, and are generally positive in leading to increased survival, productivity and hence population growth. However, we argue that the wider implications…

FWIW, virtually nobody pays the sticker price for a single article. Many researchers have some kind of institutional access (e.g., through a library). If you don’t, shoot one of the authors an email and ask for a copy. Not only will they certainly send you one—-they don’t see a penny of that money—-but you’ll also make some harried grad student’s day.

Also assuming you went to university you probably have such access via its library as an alumnus/a, though not (at least in my case) remotely, would have to actually go in and access from the network.

(I've never done so; I don't expect many people do, but especially living in the same city still I quite like the idea that in theory I can!)

Re: Does feeding garden birds do more harm than good?

#58

Post by rhizome »

lmilcin wrote: post #8

If these are migratory birds, then it is possible you are going to kill them by keeping them feeding while they should be migrating. We have this problem here in Poland Then you find birds dead because they are not adapted to surviving the winter.

Are you trying to say that the availability of food along the way can supplant a bird's entire migratory instinct?

Re: Does feeding garden birds do more harm than good?

#60

Post by somesortofsystm »

foxhop wrote: post #3

If you use Permaculture Principles you will exponentially grown biomass and animals including birds which visit your plot daily. I don't have a bird feeder and yet a huge variety of birds feed on my garden. It's just a matter of selectively sparing some plants over others. For example many small birds will eat kale and brasica seeds which are tiny and black like a poppy and each plant produces a huge abundance. Anoth…

I concur, as a permaculturist myself, 100% completely.

We get an extraordinary variety of species in our garden every year, and its because of the plants we grow - not because of the birdseed we buy in bags.

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