[Tweeters] Robins’ mystery seeds

[Marcia Ian]

Except that there are no babies yet, only eggs! And I’d say by now the parent(s) have tossed at least 40 seeds onto my deck. And there are none in the nest. The seeds are as dry as dried legumes. I’m going to have to look around for manroot plants. Curioser and curioser. 

Marcia Ian 
Bellingham 



> Regarding Marcia's seeds dropping from a Robin's nest.

> I mentioned this to my wife, knowledgeable in such matters, and she IDed

> the 'seeds' sight unseen.  She confirmed when shown the photos Marcia sent

> to me.

> They appear to be the seeds of the massive, native  'Manroot'   plant.  Try

> to guess the origin of this colloquial name.

> 

> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marah_(plant)

> This vine can compete, even as a native, with Kudzu.  We have them

> everywhere here climbing up into the trees.  See the url above for the

> stickery outside, mushy inside large fruits.

> The spines aren't really that sharp and several seeds are contained

> inside.  I have no idea why Robins would be involved.  We have 'zillions'

> of nesting robins and 'scads' of Manroot fruits hanging from all the

> trees.  We've never seen a connection between the two in 50 years here.

> Really quite a mystery.

> Doesn't seem like something a Robin would feed a baby and even if so, why

> are they dropping?

> Maybe the baby Robins find them disgusting while the mother views them as a

> health food?

> 

> Bob OBrien Portand.