Cedar Waxwings and Winterberry

Cedar Waxwing; note 'wax-like' deposits
at tips of wings and tail.

In Acton, MA, at the end of Sylvia Street (a dead end road on the west side of Route 27 as one heads toward Maynard) there is a small parking lot and a pedestrian ramp providing access to the Assabet River Rail Trail. As one descends the ramp, looking over the fence, there is a row of winterberry bushes.

Winterberry is a variety of holly that loses its leaves in the fall but retains its berries into winter. It is a popular garden plant for providing winter color. Like other holly varieties, a few male plants are required if the female plants are to bear fruit.  

I anticipated seeing the leaf-bare winterberry branches sporting a generous display of red berries. Instead, they looked picked over. And then I saw the culprits. A flock of about 20-25 Cedar Waxwings were alternating between sunning themselves in the branches of a near-by tree and diving down into the shade to sample the berries. 

Cedar Waxwings and Robins consume winterberry berries but most of the over-wintering bird species such as Sparrows, Cardinals and Blue Jays do not. Waxwings are not long-distance migrators, but they do tend to head south - to our area - in winter. 

Robins, in contrast, summer here but in the past almost all migrated south for winter, returning in spring. (Hence, "First robin of spring.") However, what with native Winterberry and invasive plants that provide berries - for example Multi-flora rose and Oriental bittersweet - significant numbers of Robins stay year-round. They travel in flocks in winter, and can clear a patch of winterberries in the course of an afternoon.  

Robin in a Winterberry thicket

Winterberry and holly berries are mildly toxic to humans and dogs and cats, in humans causing nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain and diarrhea.