For 25 years, birds have largely ignored the fruits on the English ivy that covers my back fence. Last week 100+ robins stripped it in two days, chasing off a mockingbird who'd arrived at the same time. Like barberries, ivy fruits are quite hard until frozen, and if a hard freeze first comes late enough in the season, any extra birds around will find them more convenient. Winter robins have increased in Ohio over the past thirty years on average, but their numbers vary a lot from year to year, probably depending on availability of food. I believe last year marked an all-time recent high for CBC-reported robins in the state, and there may have been more this year--especially later in January and February. The increasing use of ornamental fruiting trees and shrubs by developers has to be a factor far more important than a rise in average temperatures, but this winter the two seemed to have peaked. Robins haven't stopped migrating--most of those around now must be Canadian nesters--but there could be a reproductive advantage to wintering as close to home as possible. Thoreau enumerated the wild winter fruits of his territory: "...sumac, rose hips and so on, dogwood and so one, winterberry above all, cat-tail, haws, two-leaved Solomon-seal, barberry, shrivelled pyrus, cranberries, sweet gale, green brier, pitch pine and so on, witch hazel, panicled andromeda, bayberry, hemlock. spruce, larch, cedar, juniper, checkerberry, walnuts, birches, and alders." ("Wild Fruits"), and would have been surprised at all the extra crabapples and hawthorns around today. Barberry and ivy must be close the the bottom of the barrel, though, and regardless of temperatures I'll bet robins are moving out of our latitude. Folks just south of us in Kentucky and West Virginia have been noticing large flocks in recent days. Bill Whan Columbus ______________________________________________________________________ Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society. Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list. Additional discussions can be found in our forums, at www.ohiobirds.org/forum/. You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]