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Don't Help a Good Bird Go Bad!
Marbled Murrelets: The resident population of marbled murrelets lives mainly at sea, yet travels inland to nest. Like small torpedoes, the nesting pair flies 60 to 98 miles per hour into the ancient coast redwood forest to find a large moss-covered limb. The moss provides a ready-made nest and the immense limb keeps all ages of murrelets from falling out of the tree at the slightest breeze. One robin-size adult flies to the ocean at dawn and dusk for food, actually flying through the watery depths in search of smelt and anchovies.
Corvids: You can hear the yackety-yak of the American crow, Steller’s jay, or common raven as they fly overhead. Opportunists, they are always looking for an easy meal. e.g. trash, scraps, livestock feed, and bird feeder food. Corvid memory is even better than a bear’s. Once one of these birds has received a food reward, it will return many times, circling the site over and over.
What’s the connection? While the jay, raven, or crow is repeatedly flying over a previous food site, the bird may spy a murrelet nest high in the redwood forest canopy. The adult murrelets are camouflaged, resembling a redwood branch, but any movement of them or their babies and the corvid will zero in, making a meal of chicks and eggs and disrupting nesting patterns of the adult murrelet pair.
We need your help! Corvid numbers are on the rise while the marbled murrelets are on the decline. Most of the murrelet population in California nests within Redwood National and State Parks. Endangered in California (and federally-listed as threatened), the murrelets need your help now! Please follow these guidelines while hiking, camping, and picnicking.
Help prevent the death of murrelet chicks and eggs:
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Keep a clean camp
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Carry plastic bags for trash
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Pack out unburnable trash
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Do not throw garbage into pit toilets or cat holes
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Leave no food residue in the fire pit
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Strain food particles from waste water
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Scatter waste water
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Don’t share your lunch with any birds!
Corvids are just as important to the parks' ecosystem as murrelets and predation by corvids is a natural process. However, feeding patterns that change because humans alter the environment are not natural. Thanks for your help.
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