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Where are the Backyard Birds? by Nina Pattison In my back yard in downtown Troy there is a bird feeding station. It consists of a tall iron pole with arms - one for suet and one for oily sunflower seeds. There is also a heated bird bath near the feeding station. It has everything a bird could want. But there are no birds feeding or drinking or bathing in my garden. All is silent. At the beginning of last summer there were cardinals, bats, sparrows, and night-hawks circling above. There was even an occasional cormorant left from the four that used to swim and catch fish under the Congress Street Bridge over the Hudson. The geese were still issuing their encouraging calls, even in the middle of the night, as they flew north along the Hudson River - a route they have been using for thousands of years, I suspect. When I heard the geese calls I knew nature was doing as she should. But, then, I noticed the disappearance of the cardinals. There were no birds calling "peter, peter, peter" from my neighbors big maple tree. The squawking night hawks have disappeared, too, and there are no bats flying around at dusk catching insects. This fall the geese must have taken another route south. I missed there calls encouraging each other and saying they were following the right flock. Instead of the huge numbers of hundreds of geese there were only four or five flocks of 25 or 30 birds. The noisy, greedy blue-jays have gone for a year. I'd even welcome them back! I went to the bird-store and bought equipment to feed the birds and encourage them to return to my back yard. I put this equipment in my garden in the winter of 1997. It was December I think. At first there was a red-headed woodpecker who came regularly to dine at the suet and some little chickadees at the sunflower seeds. But now there are no birds. It is February now and there is no sign of life. The cake of suet has been there for a month, untouched, and the sunflower seeds as well. I keep the heated bird bath filled but it is only visited by an occasional squirrel. The garden is silent. Even the squirrels cannot eat from the bird feeder as there is a baffle against them. If the birds do not return, I may as well let the squirrels enjoy the food. The heated bird-bath waters unruffled by any feathers. Sometimes a squirrel drinks out of it. But no birds. In cooperation with Troy United Ink Corp., a not-for-profit corporation 
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