mountain ash tree berries

[Mary Flaum]

Greetings, 

I recently picked a lot of berries from Mountain Ash Trees in Grand Marais.  I've spread these beautiful red berries  out near my bird feeders,  both on an empty planter box and a table.  NO one seems at all interested in them. I thought the birds would be going crazy over them but they are being ignored completely.  I'm not sure which birds would be enjoying them....this is my first year in Ely so thanks for your patients.    Thoughts?  

[Stephanie Hibdon]

I have numerous mountain ash trees on my property. The robins and the grouse have been eating them right off the tree. I don't know if any other birds work on them. These are the only two species I have personally seen eating them. I would bet if you leave them out for a while somebody will find them.

On Fri, Oct 31, 2025 at 09:10 Mary Flaum <mary....@gmail.com> wrote:

Greetings, 

I recently picked a lot of berries from Mountain Ash Trees in Grand Marais.  I've spread these beautiful red berries  out near my bird feeders,  both on an empty planter box and a table.  NO one seems at all interested in them. I thought the birds would be going crazy over them but they are being ignored completely.  I'm not sure which birds would be enjoying them....this is my first year in Ely so thanks for your patients.    Thoughts?  

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[Carl Karasti]

I have sometimes observed birds being totally disinterested in mountain ash berries, while other times eating them non stop. I think their interest level in them fluctuates widely, probably depending upon what else is available to eat. If they're finding enough of other foods that are perhaps more to their liking (at the moment) or that will only be available for a short spell, that's what they'll go for, leaving the mountain ash for later because they know those berries will be available for a long time.  I don't claim to know, just speculating based on my observations. For decades I had some mountain ash in my yard but don't anymore and I've also observed birds ignoring or feeding on the berries in the wild.

Ultimately, it seems that the mountain ash berries eventually do get consumed, sometimes long after we've gotten snow.  I wouldn't be inclined to pick and serve the berries because the birds seem to be pretty efficient at harvesting the berries off the trees themselves when they're ready for them. And when it snows it's easy for them to still find the berries even out from beneath a coating of snow up high on the branches while other possible foods on or near the ground are buried and harder to locate and dig out.

Years ago, we rescued an injured cedar waxwing that we cared for until it could fly again. Dr. Chip taped its broken wing and whished it and us "good luck." We named it "Cedar" and I shared some about this here on EFN. We picked and fed him a LOT of mountain ash berries along with grapes, cherries and some other fruits and stuff from the grocery store. By the time it recovered from its broken wing, it was pretty cold, snowy and wintery here, but we were going down to Duluth for another reason, so we drove Cedar down there and released him at the Zoo parking lot because we knew there were still other waxwings around and there was still an abundant supply of mountain ash berries and other berries. Cedar immediately flew to a bush that no longer had any leaves to help identify it, but it did have some clumps of dark blue berries that he ate quite a few of before flying away. We wished him "good luck" and hoped he found "birds of a feather" friends and managed to make his way further south for the winter.

Carl Karasti

On Fri, Oct 31, 2025 at 9:10 AM Mary Flaum <mary....@gmail.com> wrote:

Greetings, 

I recently picked a lot of berries from Mountain Ash Trees in Grand Marais.  I've spread these beautiful red berries  out near my bird feeders,  both on an empty planter box and a table.  NO one seems at all interested in them. I thought the birds would be going crazy over them but they are being ignored completely.  I'm not sure which birds would be enjoying them....this is my first year in Ely so thanks for your patients.    Thoughts?  

--

[Carl Karasti]

Mary, I forgot to say, in my other reply, that I realize you were "importing" an abundant supply of mountain ash berries here from Grand Marais, which is a kind effort on your part. I haven't really paid close attention to what our local supply of barries on the branches is, but there are usually some and sometimes quite a lot of them late into the fall and early winter. There are a lot of mountain ash around Miners Lake along the Trezona Trail as well as elsewhere in the woods and in yards.

I've seen mountain ash berries being eaten by waxwings, robins, grouse, blue jays and a few other birds that I don't specifically recall at the moment. My impression is that birds prefer to eat their mountain ash berries off the branches rather than off the ground, although the grouse may be better at eating them off the ground if they find some there because they're a little awkward at navigating branches that don't do well at supporting the weight of a grouse.

Carl Karasti

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[clever...@gmail.com]

Besides the species that eat them mentioned in subsequent posts, I’ve also seen pileated woodpeckers consuming them, quite the balancing act when you consider their size and that they can only grab them by attaching to the flimsiest part of the branch, its very tip. Townsend’s solitaires and varied thrushes are also good at finding berry-laden mountain ash when they stray east from their normal ranges in western US. After the berries have fallen off the tree, I’ve also seen deer and snowshoe hare eating them, so it’s quite the versatile food.

 

Steve Wilson

Isabella

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[Alanna David]

Hey neighbors, David is going to clean our Air vents and Dryer Vents again. He did a great job for us last time, very thorough. I recommend him to everyone. If you're going through allergies, or your house is getting dusty or you haven't cleaned your ducts one year ago, it's time to get your air vents or dryer vents cleaned. If more people join in, we can get a group rate. We need at least 5 people , and the cleaning date will be based on everyone's availability. Let me know if anyone wants to join in.

The group rate is $150 for one AC unit house 

Thanks!

Interested people can message me your house address and contact number he'll add you in the list of interested ones.

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[REYNOLD MACK]

We had a Mountain Ash in the cities, White Bear Lake, and it was very pretty. The Cedar Wax Wings loved the berries. However, the berries at times ferment on the tree and as the Wax Wings eat them and get tipsy they would smash into our windows. I think they were drunk enough it didn't kill them hitting the windows. They just seemed to sleep it off, and leave. I'm wondering if those on the ground didn't attract the birds, because they are fermenting. The ones on the our tree seemed to attract the Cedar Wax Wings. Mountain Ash trees are susceptible to disease {fungus I believe}. It only lasted about 10 years or so. A great looking tree with the dark green leaves and the orange berries. I'm wondering if they have trees that are not susceptible to disease as the one we had.

 

Reynold Mack

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[Don Brown]

I had one that occasion ally would emit a propane like oder.  Maybe that was some type of fermentation but it happened in spring pre-berries.

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