How Do Small Birds Spend the Winter? A Detailed Explanation of Bird Overwintering Methods

If they are migratory small birds, they will migrate to warm places before winter arrives to spend the winter; if they are non-migratory birds, they will find a relatively warm and dry place to enter dormancy, reducing their consumption to get through the winter. So different small birds spend the winter in different ways.

1. Introduction to How Some Birds Spend the Winter

1. Nightingale

When the cold winter season with scarce food arrives, the nightjar will find a wind-sheltered tree hole to hide in and enter a dormant state. At this time, its body temperature drops from 38 degrees to around 20 degrees, in order to reduce the consumption of nutrients in its body.

2. Swallow

Some swallows living in northern Europe, whenever a cold wave strikes in winter, will also gather together in flocks and enter a dormant state. Adult swifts will fly to the warm south; while the newly hatched chicks in the nest enter a dormant state, waiting for the parent birds to return and feed them.

3. White-breasted Waterhen

The waterhen chooses a dry stone hole or mud hole and burrows inside to hibernate. In the hole, the waterhen does not eat or move, or moves very little, its breathing rate decreases, blood circulation slows down, metabolism weakens, and it reduces the consumption of nutrients in its body as much as possible, relying on stored fat to sustain life.

4. Wild Goose

When migrating, wild geese like to gather together in a huge group, sometimes forming a straight line and sometimes forming a V shape. Each migration takes about 1-2 months, going north in spring and south in autumn.

5. Budgerigar

Budgerigars have behavior similar to migration. In Australia, every winter (June to September) they occupy the north, and in summer (September to January) they gather in the south again. In the colder season they prefer to go to northern Australia and the region, while in the hot season they go to southern Australia.

6. Arctic Tern

Distributed in the Arctic and nearby areas, it is a migratory bird that experiences two summers each year, migrating south from its northern breeding grounds to the ocean near Antarctica, and then migrating north back to its breeding grounds, with the entire journey reaching more than 40,000 kilometers, which is the longest migration route known among animals.