So as a bird lover, I’ve also become a huge fan of trees and bushes in the Melastomatacea family, genus Miconia..from which a wide variety of these vastly important food plants provide massive amounts of fruits that ripen in a staggered fashion, multiple times a year.
Whenever I see open land anywhere throughout this archipelago, I try to promote the planting of melastoma trees and bushes because they are a huge food source for all variety (every color of the rainbow!) of wildlife, particularly birds.
This Blue Dacnis (non-migratory) is just one of the many gems that will feed year round and capuchin monkeys are attracted to this abundance. Migratory birds that will gorge on the fruits include summer tanager, scarlet tanager, chestnut-sided warbler, Tennessee warbler, prothonotary warbler, bay-breasted warbler, Baltimore oriole..all of which need to build up their fat reserves along their north or southward migration.
What’s more, fruiting melastomas seem to correlate with the migratory birds that pass through on their way south for the winter (some spend it with us in Panama, other species keep going onward into South America to winter in the tropical regions that provide food during the northern winter.
Further, as the birds fly north for the spring breeding season in North America, these vital, highly productive bushes and trees provide refueling stops along the hundreds or even thousands of miles these birds’ biannual journey.
With ever-further deforestation, birds across generations far into the past that follow the same migratory pathway and refueling stops are confronted with lost habitat they so dearly rely on along their incredibly long flight.
So plant melastomas! If I had my own piece of land, that’s what I’d do before ANYTHING else..because if you plant it, they will come.
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