Robin, robins everywhere

Next to a dog, the American robin is probably the closest thing to man’s best friend. Certainly it deserves that title among feathered beasts, for the robin has attached itself to humans in a way that few nondomesticated animals have.

Robins hunt across our lawns. Robins nest in our yards. Robins bathe in our puddles. Robins sing from our tree-tops – loudly announcing summer dawn and dusk, in particular. Robins willingly remain exposed to our watchfulness, even at close range. Many admirers border on the anthropomorphic in claiming that robins actually seek us out.

The American robin is often referred to by ornithologists as “one of our most familiar birds,” “America’s favorite songbird,” “our most visible and beloved songbird.” It is the state bird of Connecticut, Michigan and Wisconsin. It has even been called “our true national bird.”

You’ll find robins nesting in 49 states, in most of Canada and in lots of Mexico. In the lower 48 states, you’ll find them all winter.

Especially alluring just now, robins offer perennial hope that spring will indeed return, no matter how miserable the winter. It’s a bird of all seasons in North Idaho, but late winter is the time when we can most appreciate the robin.

I saw a lone American robin recently, during a brief break from one of the multitude of severe storms we have suffered this winter. I had to smile in appreciation of its willingness to endure this weather, too. It seemed to have an expectation similar to mine that this dreadful white stuff will pass. No doubt, however, the bird was asking itself, as I have been, what it was doing here. As with many local people, most local robins winter where it’s warmer.

In fact, our wintering robin population varies greatly from year to year. This season’s Christmas Bird Count found 121 in the Coeur d’Alene area. The 2006 count found only seven. There were 783 in 2001. There were only two in 1998.

Those that stay here find that North Idaho offers abundance for such fruit-eating birds. As with the waxwings, robins live on fruit exclusively throughout the fall and winter months. Here they find it on mountain ash trees in particular. They also relish shriveled apples still hanging from a branch, as well as hawthorn and holly berries.

Come spring, however, robins become aggressive predators, searching relentlessly for unwary worms – found early or not. In fact, invertebrates make up almost its entire diet as long as the ground is soft enough to allow robins to probe their forcepslike beaks into the soil. They will also eat beetles. They do not eat seeds. Their beaks are not adapted to crack them open. Fruit and worms, that’s their fare.

Related to this, there are two questions probably everyone has asked while watching robins hunt, for even nonbirders watch robins hunt. First, how do robins detect their prey? As they run-and-stop, as they cock their heads just so and as they pounce prior to tugging a worm from its burrow, are they listening or are they looking?

Research has clearly shown they are looking. The odd little head thing they do is to compensate for having eyes where we have ears. They have ears right next to their eyes, but they don’t use them in hunting.

Second question, how many worms can a robin eat in a day? They seem to be at it all the time. Again, research has shown, given its fill, a robin will eat the equivalent of a 14-foot worm each day. Placed end to end, that’s 168 inches of worms. That’s a lot of worms. No wonder they have to start early.

Come spring, not only will nonbirders be watching for the American robin as a hunter, but they will be listening for the robin as a caroler. Sentimentalists will claim that robins joyfully announce each new glorious day just prior to sunrise, and thankfully sing a sunset vespers at the end of each wonderfully productive day. It’s not so.

Once again, research has shown that American robins do not sing for pleasure. In fact, the robin songs that fill our summer mornings and evenings are actually calls to battle – songs of war and not songs of joy. Robins, both males and females, are terribly aggressive toward robin-kind.

During nonsinging times of the year, robins may be found together by the hundreds, the thousands and even the hundreds of thousands. When nesting season arrives, however, robins become so territorial that if singing alone does not ward off interlopers, actual physical battle will ensue.

I have on numerous occasions observed two shrieking robins clash in the air. With feet and beaks tearing at one another, they fall to the ground oblivious to all else around them. Its no wonder humankind so willingly has taken the robin into its heart. When it comes to territory, they are birds of a feather.

You may be wondering why I keep referring to the “American” robin. The name robin is actually a misnomer. The true robin is a European species not closely related to our species. The European version, though, is adorned similarly and was, in ancient times, referred to as “robin redbreast.” Now it is unimaginatively just called European robin.

In colonial times, the two birds were confused and thus we had the American version of the European species, or so they thought. In reality, our robin is a thrush, related in our area to Swainson’s thrush, hermit thrush, varied thrush, veery, western bluebird, mountain bluebird and Townsend’s solitaire.

The European robin is in a group called Old World flycatchers, of which there are only two breeding examples in North America – both of which are purely arctic species. The famous nightingale is another European member of this group.

So popular is the robin concept, there are approximately 125 species worldwide that have robin as a part of their name. Many of these are unrelated to either the American or European models. As an example, the Australian robin is more closely related to the corvids – our jays and crows.

In so many ways, American robins are indeed the universal bird. Their mud, twig and bits-of-string nests are synonymous with “bird nest.” Who has not at least seen, if not actually handled, a robin’s nest? Who has not described a color as robin-egg blue? Who has not rescued a plump baby robin from the ground? Which cat has not eaten a score of such featherballs?

Because of the robin, we look for nests in the fork of a tree. Because of the robin we think all baby birds are spotted. Because of the robin we expect baby birds to be fed worms.

The American robin is one of the few bird species that thrives in both natural and suburban habitats. The species has, obviously, benefited from both urbanization and agricultural development.

The robin is so ubiquitous that anyone can identify one. They don’t know where they learned to do so; they just know what it is as soon as they see one.

The American robin is, in so many ways, American humankind’s best bird. It is like us in so many ways. I’m not sure that’s a compliment, but it certainly is true.