Not just the early bird catches the worm in Tennessee

Robins and worms -- the iconic image! I am in Tennessee, it’s the end of November and the cold has set in. One evening there was a smattering of rain for about an hour and I just happened to look out the front door to find the neighbours lawns covered with birds pecking away and eating something. I could not see what species of bird they were till they flew onto our lawn. I was pretty shocked to realise that they were robins, the American robin which is much larger than the cute British Robin. When they flew onto our lawn I realised this was a strange phenomenon I was witnessing. I asked my son later what they were eating and he explained that they are quite starved during the winter as robins eat earthworms. The ground gets hard as rock with the cold and dry and the grass turns brown and goes dormant in the winter. So, they find it hard to get insects and worms to eat.

Amazing sight which can be enjoyed especially when it rains When it rains heavily, though, the worms have little choice. Earthworms get their oxygen from the soil in which they live in. When the soil gets soaked with water rather than air, they come to the surface to "breathe" just like we do when we're swimming. And that exposes them to predators: It’s a feast and a field day for the robins. It is one of the most common of all sights in spring and summer across most of the U.S.: the familiar American robin (Turdus migratorius) bobbing across a grass lawn or garden, cocking its head and pausing frequently, then pulling a long earthworm right out of the soil. While robins also devour beetles, caterpillars, fruits, and berries, it is the sight of that robin tugging at a worm that has been made iconic by cartoonists.

The American Robin is bigger in size than it's British cousin The robin I read up online, is the state bird of 3 states: Connecticut, Michigan, and Wisconsin. The American Robin is a song bird and is one of the first birds to sing at dawn. Apparently they are migratory and a member of the thrush family. Worms are the ideal food for omnivorous birds such as robins and other thrushes. While birds will eat just about any type of worm they can catch, earthworms and insect larvae are the most common food. American robins ignore earthworm vibrations and any noise that they may make, but rather use their eyesight to detect earthworms, and other invertebrates, especially in spring and summer.

Robin and earthworm in the garden I really enjoy watching a robin on the lawn, it first cocks its head from side to side, so that it can better scan the ground searching for an earthworm. Having monocular vision, they don't see by looking forward as we and owls do. Experiments have shown that a dead earthworm in a hole will be seen and eaten by a hungry robin. "The early bird gets the worm" is true in the case of the American Robin, except following rain, as my story goes, as when the dry season sets in, with little or no precipitation, as the sun warms the ground and dries the morning mist, earthworms and night- crawlers retreat to cooler and moister soil out of reach of the hungry robin.