An article in the Guardian recently warned us that feeding the ducks may be a long held tradition but it is not a good idea. It has always been questionable whether chunks of Mother’s Pride were ideal food for water fowl but the situation has become acute over the last 18 months. Lockdowns have driven us into our parks in unprecedented numbers and feeding the birds has offered a way to enliven our walks and keep the kids amused.
The Guardian article was triggered by the Royal Parks’ launch of their ‘Help Nature Thrive’ campaign – an attempt to persuade park visitors to ‘appreciate and observe wildlife in its natural habitat, rather than seeking an up close and personal experience’ by feeding it. But it is not only the Royal Parks that suffer.
Excessive feeding encourages aggressive birds such as gulls and crows who will bully other birds and steal their eggs and chicks. Each lake or pond can only sustain so many birds but more food means populations increase to unsustainable numbers. According to the Royal Parks the population of crows around the Serpentine had increased tenfold since 2004 while the number of swans on the lake has exploded. There are now 175 of them across Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens whereas in 1990 there were only 13!
The danger of the larger numbers is that because there is not enough room for everyone to breed a few dominant males may end up by bullying the whole flock.
(On Hampstead Heath the Corporation of London seem to have taken a more proactive stance and we only have one family of swans on each pond, each year’s signets being shipped off elsewhere once they are grown. Although I have noticed that heath visitors do try to feed the swan families.)
Greater numbers of birds also mean a greater risk of disease while left over food can attract rats. Meanwhile excessive waterfowl faeces and bits of soggy bread will impact the water quality. There is also the issue that the birds come to rely on human offerings that are nutritionally inappropriate for them instead of hunting their own food. The Royal Parks make the point that there is plenty of food for all the wildlife in all of their parks and indeed in all other city parks and that they really do not need any extra. (According to the RSPB, if we really must feed birds we should avoid bread and go instead for sweetcorn, porridge oats, crumbled biscuits, defrosted frozen peas or bird seed.)
Check out the Parks’ Help Nature Thrive campaign details in which they both explain why feeding wildlife is a generally bad idea but also suggest other ways in which visitors of all ages can engage with wildlife in parks apart from feeding them.
Hollyhocks in Haggerston, the Grand Union – and swimming dogs