What Birds Eat: How to Preserve the Natural Diet and Behavior of North American Birds

"What Birds Eat enriches our understanding of birds overall." -- The Birding Wire

We all know that a freshly filled bird feeder will attract hungry sparrows, but do you sometimes wish you knew what birds really wanted to eat?

• Explains bird physiology and natural diets, including detailed profiles of their food preferences


• Robust selection of photographs and illustrations

Chapters include:

• How birds evolved


• The anatomy and physiology of how birds eat


• Feeding behavior


• Bird diets: insects


• Bird diets: plants


• Bird diets: animals


• Challenges and solutions


• How to support birds

What Birds Eat explores not only the what of bird diets, but also the how and the why. Birds rely on their senses to detect healthy food and have evolved over millennia to find and digest whatever foods are most plentiful -- and nutritious -- in their environment. But birds also need our help; we must protect their natural habitats and provide the right kinds of foods for them in our own backyards. Copiously illustrated with color photos and detailed drawings, including samples of their natural diet such as grasses, nuts, fish, rodents, insects, and more, this informative handbook also features concise diet profiles of 130 common North American bird species.