BIRDS IN HARVESTED GRAIN FIELDS

      Though cultivated for crops that are harvested to the ground, much of southeastern Pennsylvania's farmland is still green and lovely in summer.  And, although cropland appears barren of wildlife, it is not.  Even grain fields that are harvested to the ground have a surprising variety of adaptable wildlife dining among the golden stubble and rows of recently sprouted hay, corn or soybean plants planted soon after the harvest of grain and straw.  

     Just like geese, crows and other kinds of birds that visit harvested corn fields in winter to eat corn kernels on the ground, a variety of birds enter harvested grain fields in summer to consume grain.  The more commonly seen birds on those golden banquet tables of stubble then are rock pigeons, mourning doves, house sparrows, American robins, purple grackles, starlings, killdeer plovers and horned larks.  These adaptable birds add their kinds of beauty and interest to harvested grain fields.  

     Flocks of pigeons, doves and house sparrows ingest grain from the ground of harvested grain fields.  The regal pigeons, being dark, stand out in the yellow stubble where their feeding and courtship activities are easily seen.  Males puff out their feathers and strut around their mates, cooing to them all the while.  But the females continue eating grain and seem unimpressed with their mates' courting and cooing.  When their stomachs and crops are full of grain, the pigeons take off as a group and swiftly fly back to the barns and bridges where they raise several broods of young during the warmer months.

     Mated pairs and little groups of doves, which are related to pigeons, zip onto the fields on wildly whistling wings.  Doves are brown and often difficult to spot in grain fields.  Like pigeons, they walk around and pick up grain from the ground.  And, male doves court their mates by strutting and cooing through the grain fields.  Mourning doves raise broods of young in twig and grass nurseries in trees and shrubbery on lawns and in hedgerows between fields. 

     Flocks of lively, little house sparrows hop about in grain fields fairly close to the buildings where they raise offspring in cracks and other sheltered spots in those buildings.  These sparrows are mostly brown and not easily seen among the golden stubble until they move.  Though thought to be pests by many farmers, these little sparrows, which really are weaver finches from Europe, liven many barnyards and fields.             

     Individual American robins and purple grackles, and little groups of starlings, mostly feed on crickets, earthworms and other kinds of invertebrates they find on the exposed ground of harvested grain fields.  Robins run and stop repeatedly on the grain fields as they do on lawns when searching for food.  Grackles and starlings, however, walk methodically as they watch for little creatures to ingest.  

     Robins, grackles and starlings are all lawn birds that are adaptable enough to feed in fields, as well as on lawns.  Robins nest in deciduous trees and shrubbery, grackles raise young in half-grown coniferous trees for the most part, and starlings hatch babies in cracks in buildings.  

     I also see robin-sized killdeer plovers and many sparrow-sized horned larks on harvested grain fields.  In fact, the larks' numbers in croplands dominate that human-made habitat the year around.  The brown-on-top, camouflaged killdeer and larks mostly consume invertebrates in meadows and fields during warmer months, and hatch young on the ground in cultivated fields when those fields are mostly bare ground. 

     Killdeer and horned larks evolved in habitats that have little or short vegetation, including mud flats and gravel bars, short-grass prairies and Arctic tundra.  Therefore, they are well adapted to dining, living and nesting in human-made cropland.

     Harvested grain fields are not as barren as they appear.  Like other fields in farmland, many harvested grain fields have a surprising abundance of life in them.