T. A. Coward

“ As the northern spring approaches, the strongest of all animal instincts, on which reproduction and the very existence of the species depend, overcomes all other desires, and the bird grows restless. The hereditary instinct; the origin of which we have endeavoured to show, urges the bird to seek the breeding area which has by degrees become so far removed from the winter quarters. ”

“ The natural answer, the cravings of nature and sexual impulses fails to give satisfaction in every case. Wanderings in search of food might lead in any direction, and probably did in the first place, but new birds in the main travel south in search of food and north in search of home, and many of them perform immense journeys, passing over or through lands which are capable of supporting a wealth of bird-life even in the winter months. ”

“ From what little we do know about the behaviour of our summer birds in their winter home, we may safely conclude that their habits are similar to those of winter visitors to Britain. Only in a few species are there two restricted areas, two abiding places or homes. The necessity of retaining a secure home for the young and the care of these young during their more helpless age keeps the individual birds within a certain area during the breeding season, but at all other times the bird is more or less of a wanderer. ”

“ They may play at and actually perform a migration which is so closely bound up with the life of the species. That this impulse has not always sufficient strength to force them to perform the Whole journey is apparent from the fact that many non-breeders, young or sexually mature, on their northward journey through our islands or along our coasts, never reach the breeding area; the food supply on the way attracts them more than the memory of home; they linger with us until the breeding season is over and the return journey has begun. ”

“ It has been suggested that some of the sexually mature non-breeders may be actually enjoying their winter during our summer; in other words that they have bred in southern breeding-stations whilst their congeners wintered in the same zone. This means a double breeding-area for certain species—a possible explanation, but one hardly supported by known facts. When a bird had so cosmopolitan a range that in the course of its dispersal its breeding areas were separated, we almost invariably find that the birds inhabiting these two areas are distinguishable geographical forms or sub-species. ”

“ The memory of the bird, call it instinctive memory if we like, would limit the wanderings in search of food to a certain number of places where food was most abundantly found, and the passage between feeding area and breeding area become regular journeys, at the seasons of the year when an increasing number of young birds in the breeding area drove the overgrown population to seek food further from the base, and again when the sexual impulses urged the birds to seek secure nesting sites. ”

“ Possibly in the early days of migration only the mature birds did return; that we cannot state one way or the other. But it is reasonable to argue that once a regular migration habit hat become not only confirmed by heredity but a very true advantage to the species, its influence will be felt by each and every individual. Again it is clear that the sexual impulses, in an undeveloped form, are appreciated by the adolescent, and in many animals by even the most juvenile. ”

“ It seems probable that the breeding area of some of the birds which reach the British Islands in autumn by the so-called east and west route is in more southerly latitudes than our islands, and certainly it seems evident that the temperature of the winter refuge has more effect upon the birds than its geographical position. Perhaps the statement that a bird always nests in the coldest part of its range is more universally correct. ”

“ The seasonal return of cold would drive them southwards in winter, and the periodical migration habit would thus be originated.
The intense love of home during the spread of glacial conditions would tend rather towards extinction than the formation of any new habits. The birds which possessed the greatest attachment to the particular district would be less likely to fly from adverse conditions, and the reduction of their numbers through the ordinary physiological changes in habit—reduction of the number of young produced, and possibly disinclination to pair—would inevitably end in extinction. ”

“ The winter quarters, or the outermost limits of the individual but not necessarily the specific range, having been reached, the bird spends its time in seeking food, remaining in one place if food is plentiful, or wandering, according to necessity or the habit of the species. The assertion that some birds have a second breeding season in their southern home is either unsupported by any direct evidence or is the result of a mistake in identification ”

“ The individuals and the species, if not. the whole families of birds, which failed to retreat, went the way of the "thousand types." On the retreat of the ice, the birds, impelled by a mysterious hereditary memory of home and of the good times enjoyed by their remote ancestors, for very very many generations must have been born under more or less sedentary conditions during the Ice Age, began the same pushing forward each year to the limits allowed them. ”

“ The advantages of the power of flight, to which also it owes its development, include the ability to avoid active and passive enemies, and to remove from one feeding ground to another undeterred by the barriers which restrict the terrestrial animal. A natural sequence of this ability to take advantage of aerial locomotion is the habit of wandering in search of food, more or less noticeable in all birds. The habit of wandering led to the discovery of feeding grounds and suitable nesting places ”

“ They visit fields top—dressed with manure, glean the refuse of the harvest, frequent the farmyards, and in early spring, visit the budding larches to prey upon their insect pests. On the other hand golden plovers and lapwings are remarkably local in their winter habits, and so long as the weather remains open will frequent the same fields throughout the Winter. ”

“ Birds are structurally provided with the means of escaping from the disastrous effects of adverse circumstances; the power of flight, though not the only way in which animals can migrate, is at the root of the migration of birds. ”

“ There are certain birds which breed in Australia and winter in Oceania islands where the temperature is cooler than in their breeding area.
When considering the migration of birds which summer in the extreme north or breed in the extreme south—alas, but little is known about the migratory habits of many southern breeders—it is comparatively simple to offer an explanation; in the long winter months this home, so desirable in the short weeks of daylight, is dark, ice-bound, and foodless ”

“ Food supply has not failed when most birds start their journey in search of food! Again in spring, when it is claimed that the powerful sexual impulses are sufficient reason to account for the northward journey, hosts of sexually immature birds and of others which are apparently mature but do not breed that spring, migrate northwards, some even arriving before the mature birds of their own species. ”

“ A fact which supports the theory that birds ramble far in search of food in their winter quarters, is that in many species the winter range is more extensive than the breeding area. Thus Mr Cooke shows that the known breeding area of the Pacific golden plover has an east and west extension of some 1700 miles, but in winter it ranges over an area with an east and west extension of about 10,000 miles. ”

“ Birds of prey, and many of the cited instances of long tenancy refer to raptorial birds, have a wonderful power of finding a mate, male or female, to complete the hatching and rearing of the young, when one of a pair has been destroyed. The survivor of any pair might have the home attachment and by bringing a fresh mate create an attachment which would be passed on from mate to mate indefinitely. Again it must not be overlooked that certain sites present advantages to particular species which must be evident to all in search of those advantages ”

“ Those birds which do not leave the breeding area at the proper season will suffer and ultimately become extinct, and the same will happen to those which fail to leave the winter quarters when it would be a distinct advantage to the species to move into lands better suited for reproduction. ”

“ When there is a plentiful harvest of beech-mast, chaffinches and bramblings will linger near one clump or avenue of beeches for many weeks, but when, as often happens, the mast crop fails, they become nomadic, and pass from place to place in their hunt for food. ”

“ Great stress has been laid on the attachment of birds to certain nesting sites, an undoubted fact, and it has been argued that because, in some cases, for hundreds of years certain sites have been occupied by the same species, it is evident that after the death of parents the young will return to and occupy the home. ”

“ When in the early days of migration this periodically-supplied northern zoological vacuum was filled to overflowing by the increased numbers of avian inhabitants at the close of the breeding season, the natural food supply would be taxed to its limits; the falling temperature drove some and finally all to seek food further south, and their short migration to lands already filled with old and young birds, caused pressure and overcrowding further south. ”

“ For instance the flocks of fieldfares, redwings, and some of the finches which come to winter in the British Islands wander continually from feeding ground to feeding ground, remaining in one place only so long as the food supply is plentiful. ”

“ It has been put forward as a serious objection to many arguments that migration, instead of being advantageous to birds, is a danger to the race; that the perils of the journey are greater than those occasioned by more sedentary habits. It has even been suggested that migration is a, habit specially created to thin down the surplus bird population. ”

“ Many of the birds which migrate northwards or homewards are sexually immature, and others of them are undoubtedly to be classed as "non-breeders," which means that during that particular summer they will not be engaged in the work of reproduction; why, then, should young birds or non-breeders migrate from the winter base. ”

“ The earlier students of migration insisted that temperature was the sole cause of change of abode: that the northern lands became unsuitable through their falling temperature, and that the birds deserted them for warmer climes, returning when the lands they wintered in became too hot. ”

“ During the evolution of the route many bases would be found which were superior to others, and skipping and the gradual shortening of the journey from one to another would result, The final goal, the food base which in any weather or season provide the safe sufficiency of food, having been reached by the birds, this becomes the Winter quarters. ”

“ The majority of Arctic birds or those nesting in high latitudes leave before the great harvest of autumn fruits, and even our common swift begins to depart—for all do not go at once—towards the end of July, when insects are more abundant than at any other time of the year. ”

“ Before the winter resident golden plovers have arrived in autumn and after they have departed in spring, the favourite fields are regularly visited by passing flocks, and the lower reaches of the Mersey, where the common sandpipcr is rare as a summer resident, are visited every autumn by parties of birds on passage. Chance may lead a casual wanderer to a good food-supplying spot, but the regularity of appearance suggests habit and memory. ”

“ Memory and experience guide them from place to place. This regular visitation of certain food bases, being of the greatest importance to birds which have a long period of travel or wandering before them, tends to originate the so-called route by which they travel. The fact that as a rule these stages are in consecutive steps southward is surely due to the fact that the temperature is falling in the north more rapidly than in the south. That they are not always clue south is certain. ”

“ The young wanderer which reached unsuitable lands must either wander further or perish. Judging by the juvenile mortality amongst young birds the failures would be many, and only the successful competitors would return to leave progeny. ”

“ As a variant of this notion, which cannot be lightly cast aside, the suggestion was mooted that it was not cold but the lack of food during the cold months which drove them south, and that in the Tropics, where at one time it was thought that all migratory birds wintered, food was scarce during the months of extreme heat. ”

“ The congestion due to the increased numbers driven to a restricted area, would involve a rebound outwards, and the uninhabited areas northward of the refuge would be the natural bourn towards which the birds would travel. ”