Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Drunk birds

Sitting here in the living room with a cup of coffee and it's a cool, blustery day outside.

Flocks of blue jays, cardinals, robins and assorted little brown birds are acting crazy. Jittery. Flying around, down, up again like they've all got the itch.

Blue jays are eating some kind of berry and two of them flew smack into my windows just a few minutes ago.

I think those berries have turned.

Oh, [bleep], make that three birds smacking into the windows.

Easy way to catch geese is leave out some fermented grain out for them.

After a while they wobble so much,easy pickings.

We have had several of what we call mud birds fly into the picture window,they seem to misjudge their landing spot on the window ledge.

I have heard but never witnesed it, that ruffed grouse will get drunk on wild grapes.

A few years ago, the IDFG found close to 2500 dead mallards. It took some investigation but they found out that they'd been eating some moldy corn dumped by a local feedlot.

When I was a kid, my grandfather owned a vineyard in the Finger Lakes of NY. On more than one Thanksgiving we watched drunk deer and/or turkeys stumbling through the rows after eating unpicked grapes.

When I was a kid we used to have big robin migrations come through. They would eat our firethorn berries (pyracantha) and act drunk. They would flop around in the street, crash into stuff and crap everywhere. I don't know if they are poison or intoxicating or what.

I know two Mexican nationals that swear they hunt turkey with a bottle of tequilla and a loaf of bread. They say they soak rolled up doughballs in the booze and when the turk has eaten enough of them they arent to hard to catch.

Time to time I see where some eastern state- Penn. usually, has to close the bear season as blackies are wandering around in town, bumping into things, falling asleep on lawns....

I WILL not tell you about the first black bear I ever killed, in May, near Livengood, Alaska, on my way to the remote cabin for the summer....but it's stomach had over a gallon of cranberries from the fall before in it... I just call it the marinated bear.... Damned good eating!

I grew up in northeast Ohio outside of Youngstown. We always had a couple wayward robins that hung around all winter, and eventually they'd get around to the crabapple tree in our front yard. They'd get drunk on those berries. You could walk right up to them. Weird thing is, the cedar waxwings would come through, and clean that tree off in one visit. You'd have to be home and watching the tree to know they'd even come through. They'd be in and out in about 45 minutes, but they never showed any ill effects from the little crabapples.

I have seen similar behavior from gray tree rats and crows eating green pine cones.
They both will spend hours eating these green pine cones and afterwards the crows can be approached closely, then only flying short distances to another tree. The squirrels tend to come the the ground and lay down awhile before walking away slowly as if drunk.

Here's an excerpt from an article on birds getting drunk on berries.

Used to see birds here get trashed on fermented china berries.