Your Bird Feeder Is Changing Evolution

Blackcaps from central Europe now winter in British gardens, on a migration route written in their genes. British great tits have longer beaks than Dutch ones, possibly thanks to feeders. Forty years of garden feeding have reshaped which birds visit, and crowded feeders helped spread diseases that hit greenfinches in Britain and house finches in North America. We look at the evidence, and at what the RSPB, the British Trust for Ornithology and Project FeederWatch now advise about feeding birds safely. Chapters 0:00 A Warbler That Changed Its Map 0:58 A Nation of Bird Feeders 1:51 The Blackcaps' New Route 3:39 Longer Beaks in British Gardens 5:08 Who Wins at the Feeder 6:35 The Greenfinch Crash 8:24 House Finch Eye Disease 9:38 What the Experts Now Advise Sources - nature.com, 2 pages: https://nature.com/ - doi.org, 7 pages: https://doi.org/ - RSPB, 3 pages: https://rspb.org.uk/ - University of Sheffield, Evolution in your back…: https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/biosciences/news/evolution-your-back-garden-great-tits-may-be-adapting-their-beaks-birdfeeders - Science News, How bird feeders may be changing…: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/how-bird-feeders-may-be-changing-great-tits-beaks - British Trust for Ornithology, 3 pages: https://bto.org/ - journals.plos.org, 2 pages: https://journals.plos.org/ - pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov, 2 pages: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ - National Audubon Society, House Finch: https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/bird/house-finch - Project FeederWatch, Feeding birds: https://feederwatch.org/learn/feeding-birds/ - Chart data: 2008 estimates cited in PLOS ONE, 2024 - Chart data: Robinson et al. 2010, PLOS ONE - Chart data: Lawson et al. 2012, Philosophical Transactions of… Media credits CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/): tobijw https://inaturalist.org/observations/365842816 Нурхайдарова Татьяна https://inaturalist.org/observations/332465687 Tomas Broucek https://inaturalist.org/observations/353438700 Alexis Lours https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=164516401 Codrin Bucur https://inaturalist.org/observations/75799516 William Stephens https://inaturalist.org/observations/144741127 Santiago Ron https://inaturalist.org/observations/16905498 rowan_m https://inaturalist.org/observations/51999076 Sascha Nunheim https://inaturalist.org/observations/105983364 Paolo Zucca https://inaturalist.org/observations/7251144 SteveM4560 https://inaturalist.org/observations/258365796 Susan Marley https://inaturalist.org/observations/106499018 Codrin Bucur https://inaturalist.org/observations/127095661 Paul Lewis https://inaturalist.org/observations/286738397 Christoph Moning https://inaturalist.org/observations/103541670 zebedeugalinha https://inaturalist.org/observations/253298182 Donald Davesne https://inaturalist.org/observations/83075710 Ксения Волянская https://inaturalist.org/observations/333441894 Christoph Moning https://inaturalist.org/observations/57657970 dennisvo https://inaturalist.org/observations/48944342 Bill Levine https://inaturalist.org/observations/140285887 Bill Levine https://inaturalist.org/observations/310236153 Paul Lewis https://inaturalist.org/observations/54846300 CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/): Tim Felce (Airwolfhound) https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=27813639 CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/): Llewee https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=94397891 Paulo Martins https://inaturalist.org/observations/109256141 HelljumperCZ https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=85618049 CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/): Paul Trafford https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=85634982 Jacob Spinks from Northamptonshire, England https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=37128343 caroline legg https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=153654225 Public domain / CC0: 5 from iNaturalist, 4 from Wikimedia Commons. Map data: Natural Earth (public domain), naturalearthdata.com Images labelled "AI-generated illustration" are artistic reconstructions made with an AI image model from our own prompts. They are not photographs. Narration: synthetic voice (Azure AI Speech) reading our own researched script. Music: original, made with our own algorithmic composer. #birds #birdFeeders