Wherever you live, you have birds. You may even, like me, have a favorite bird. It might be a rarely sighted one that, whenever you see it, makes your heart sing. Or it might be a relatively abundant species whose company you appreciate on the daily. They are our feathered fellow travelers on this planet, wherever we go. Too often, though, they’re overlooked. Not underappreciated; bird lovers and bird-watchers are legion. But birds are facing a precarious situation that not all passive or even active bird lovers seem to be aware of.
A 2019 paper with the deadpan title “Decline of the North American Avifauna” delivered this heartbreaking one-sentence summary: “Cumulative loss of nearly three billion birds since 1970, across most North American biomes, signals a pervasive and ongoing avifaunal crisis.” Forests alone have lost 1 billion birds. Grassland populations declined by 53%. Here in the West, according to the 2022 U.S. State of the Birds Report, we’ve lost 20% of our forest birds since the early 1990s. And though our arid-land populations improved slightly over the previous decade, they have otherwise been in an extended decline, with birds like the greater sage grouse suffering most dramatically.
I’m not going to go on and on about the great blue heron, as I am wont to do. But I will say this: If their populations declined precipitously, or their range shifted far from the places I frequent, that is a loss that I would certainly feel, a reduction in joy relative to the place this bird has taken up in my heart. I would still find joy, because it has become part of my nature to lean into the things that bring me joy. But the world, and my experience of it, would be diminished.
Birds give the world much more than joy, it turns out. They provide what are called, reductively, “ecosystem services,” such as seed dispersal, pest control and pollination. There’s even an economic argument, for those who need it: According to the 2019 paper, “47 million people spend 9.3 billion U.S. dollars per year through bird-related activities in the U.S.” In this issue, High Country News focuses on a couple of iconic bird species, examining their struggles and the ongoing efforts to preserve their habitat and the ecosystem services they provide. Birds are an indicator of greater ecological health and integrity. Losing birds means we are losing much more than birds.
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