Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Conditioning Wildlife

After posting about bees, one of my awesome friends began to notice something funky with the wildlife around her.  The animals' behaviors began to appear conditioned towards expectations of human assistance rather than independent survival.
Example behavior: hummingbird searching porch for hummingbird feeder instead if searching flowers.
Okay, here's to hoping there was some form of sugar left on the porch that the rain turned into hummingbird feed.  You can actually find seed kits at places like target to your everyday garden center that have a blend of seeds to grow butterfly and hummingbird gardens.  This gives you a visually stunning garden spot and brings the wildlife to you without conditioning them to expect sustenance from feeders.
Example behavior: ducks that just walk up the street in winter because they've never witnessed migration.
I dunno, our local weather usually keeps fairly warm.  This past winter, I had a duck try and enter my car to escape the winter cold.  Sorry ducks, I don't know what to do for you.

Are we conditioning local wildlife or is this more of a symbiotic relationship?  I'm no wildlife expert.  

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