How birds beat the heat

It's been a tough summer for some of our breeding birds.

They've been enduring a drought stretching from west central Minnesota into Montana that worsened as the solstice passed. Grassland parent birds were flying a half-mile round trip to find insects to feed their young. They likely were feeding four or five babies dozens of times a day.

Observers saw that situation in the Dakotas in early July. Nestlings were small for their age or starving.

"Because of the drought, grassland songbirds are wrapping up their breeding season about two weeks early," wrote Nancy Drilling in an e-mail I received on July 4.

Drilling is with the American Bird Conservancy, working out of Beach, N.D., and Larslan, Mont. She posted to a North Dakota e-mail bird list.

"In some of the grasslands, there are no bugs to be had," she wrote. "So the birds are congregating in unmowed hayfields and ditches, where the vegetation is thicker and there are more bugs.

"There still are nests, but many are failing during the nestling stage. Many of the nestlings are small for their ages," Drilling wrote.

"We're thinking that the parents can't find enough food for them. We've seen parents fly up to a quarter-mile to find food for the nestlings," she wrote.

We've driven South Dakota gravel roads when the temperature was above 100 degrees. Our road-trip timing might be considered unusual, but the temperature for South Dakota wasn't.

We saw a few birds, many of them juveniles. Western meadowlarks and lark buntings were perched atop fenceposts, panting. This is one way birds cool down. The juvenile larks pulled body feathers high, hitching up their skirts to expose skin on their legs. This is a cooling strategy. They opened their wings to gain any breeze.

Some of the buntings were on fence wires, perching tight to posts. Clever birds, they were sitting on the shady side, taking advantage of the slim shadow drawn by the sun.

The birds in our yards might not respond in such visible ways to heat. There are days, though, when they are stressed, in need of cooling situations.

Birds don't sweat. Exposed skin — faces, legs — radiates heat. Soaring high in cooler air helps. Lifting feathers to boost air circulation is a common response. Birds also seek shade, and they feed in cooler morning and evening hours. They bathe, splashing themselves wet to both clean and cool.

Water, of course, is key. Bird baths are the old standard. Baths with fountains can be even better; birds are attracted to moving water. We've used a container hung to drip into the water. Shallow pans of water set in the shade work. A couple of weeks ago I cut open a plastic dry-cleaning bag, spread it on the grass in the shade, then added water. It spread unevenly, making puddles and pools.

Keeping your feeders filled in hot weather is a good idea. Cooling is energy-intensive.

We've learned not to expect birds to react immediately to our efforts. They use water when they find it if they need it. You can lead a bird to water, as the saying goes, but you can't make it drink.

Read Jim Williams' birding blog at startribune.com/wingnut.