Letter: Starlings are a nuisance

Editor:

I would more than welcome the Wildlife Service to poison starlings on my property. Starlings are an obnoxious, aggressive, shrill bird; they come every spring to nest in our grove of trees. They take every available nesting cavity in the trees chasing out the native species. I watched them one spring so harass a pair of red-shafted flickers, that they abandoned the nesting cavity they had just drilled. Starlings are very territorial of their nesting areas and let no other birds within it; thus robins aren’t able to nest in the same areas and for the littlest birds, forget it. The year that we took measures against the starlings nesting in the trees, we saw a much wider array of native birds and the robins had better nesting success.

Starling are also a very messy bird. The area under their nesting cavities and roosting limbs are nasty; you need to be sure and not park the car in such an area or you won’t be able to see out the window. I’ve noticed the last two seasons that we didn’t seem to have as many starlings nesting. Since we live within two miles of Horton’s feedlot, the reduction in their numbers there probably explains it.

I live the exact same distance from Horton’s that Mary Jo Upham does and have never seen a dead starling in the yard. Nor have any of my cats been affected by dead birds. In my point of view, the fewer starlings there are the better native birds will do. Starlings are like any introduced species that have done extremely well. They’ve become a weed.

Dianne McQuaid
Wellington