Native Birds Could Use A Helping Hand
From the Hartford Courant, Sunday, April 14, 2013
Empidonax flycatcher, one of Connecticut’s aerial insectivores. Photo by Melissa Groo/Melissagroo.com
by Milan Bull
Spring birds are arriving in Connecticut. Eastern phoebes returned recently, and before the end of April we’ll be seeing and hearing barn swallows, tree swallows and purple martins.
Those four birds are among 17 species native to our state that eat only insects they catch on the wing.
There’s another similarity too. Since the mid 1960s, all 17 of these “aerial insectivores” have experienced a severe population decline throughout their range and especially in New England and Canada.
Purple martins, for example, have declined by 40 percent, according to annual breeding bird records kept by the federal government. Barn swallow populations have fallen by 64 percent and chimney swifts by a frightening 95 percent.
