The steep decline of insectivores in Ontario is telling us they're running out of insect food

Birds that eat flying insects are in a shocking and mysterious decline, says the co-editor of the new Atlas of Breeding Birds in Ontario. “It is an alarm bell,” Gregor Beck, a wildlife biologist and the book’s co-editor, said. The atlas, created after five years of research and employing 1.2 million individual bird records from Pelee Island to Hudson Bay, found most of the birds that eat flying insects declined 30 to 50 per cent in the last 20 years. The birds include some swallows, the common nighthawk (Chordeiles minor), the whip-poor-will (Caprimulgus vociferus) and the chimney swift (Chaetura pelagica). The decline was the biggest shock that came from the research, Beck said. We need to be very concerned, he said. Other insectivores are in steep decline as well. Reptile populations have declined drastically in Ontario over the past century. The Ontario Endangered Species Act, 2007 considers 18 of the province’s 24 reptile species (75%!) to be at risk. Fewer amphibian species are considered to be at risk, although amphibian populations are declining in parts of the province. Three species – timber rattlesnake, spring salamander and tiger salamander – have been extirpated.

Sources:
Canada.com, March 7, 2008
http://www.canada.com/windsorstar/news/story.html?id=d22b16fd-97dd-4b04…
Ontario Nature
http://www.ontarionature.org/protect/species/threats_to_reptiles_and_am…