THE GREAT WREN DEBATE REVISITED
by Barbara Boyle
Althea Sherman had an intimate and complex relationship with the
House wren. She studied the House wren for nearly thirty years,
observing and recording all aspects of the bird, including feeding,
courtship, breeding, nest life and the wren's relationship with its own
and other species of birds.
Miss Sherman's journals indicate that her association with the House
wren began peacefully enough. She maintained several bird boxes in
her yard and plugged the entrance holes of unused boxes with corncobs to
keep House sparrows out. Ever-watchful, Miss Sherman was aware
when the House wren first visited her dooryard and observed as a male
wren poked, pushed and dashed at the corncob, trying to gain
entry. In her journal, Miss Sherman wrote, "...If the House
Wren has not been here before, how did it know a hole was
there?" She then set about making or adapting (with smaller
entrance holes) six houses for the wrens.
The male wren attracted a mate and they raised the first family of
wrens in the Sherman dooryard. Miss Sherman greatly enjoyed the
perky song and the lively character of the species. She found them
to be comically pompous and self-righteous, especially the males.
In one journal entry she said, "Young hatched. Papa coming in for a
great deal of scolding, apparently too clumsy to assist in feeding of
young, although he had been permitted to feed Mama-Wren before the
hatching. Sheepishly and somewhat nettled, he keeps guard over the
box, possibly for want of better employment." She later wrote
of the mother, "A flock of 6 baby Wrens with a ruffled mother,
scolding and busy, made the yard prohibitive. Anything in sight
displeased her ladyship, who undoubtedly swelled up with the importance
of presiding over so large a family. She scolded at anything or
everything, even a passing automobile and the blowing of a distant
factory whistle. Busy, but very happy, she led her flock about from bush
to tree, never resting a minute until after putting them to bed, when
she usually spent a little time feeding alone."
It was not long until all the houses and still other cavities were
filled with wrens. In the third season since their arrival Miss
Sherman tallied in her journal that ten pairs of wrens were nesting on
her property (and more yet in surrounding areas). Even with the
conservative projections of five nestlings per pair, she estimated fifty
wrens could be raised in her dooryard that season, and this did not
include the likelihood of more than one brood.
This did, however, allow much opportunity for study. Regarding
behavior, she noted that the male wren bonds with the house more than
with his mate. One male was recorded to outlive a succession of
five mates in one season, maintaining the same house throughout. She
wrote of the wide range of proclivities, such as polygamy, and skills of
the wrens as parents. The males, she wrote, were often more talk
than action. She recorded the practice of the female wren
gathering her fledglings each evening at dusk and leading them to a
roosting place where she would tuck them in and leave them for the
night. This occurred in an abandoned catbird nest, a robin
platform, a hanging basket and so on.
Miss Sherman was the first to report of females fighting to the death
over mate and house. These battles would he lengthy, with great
chasing, stalking, scolding, fanning of wings, and then determined and
deadly attacks. They would clinch together and roll and plunge
their beaks into each other until one or the other was driven off or
killed. During these confrontations one or more males would sit
atop their houses and sing.
The first indication of Miss Sherman's distress is noted early in the
fourth season with the entry, "The character of the Wren, the fact
that I have seen it destroy Phoebe's nest, also that it was the only
species around to do the evil deed make me confident that it was the
Wren that threw two Phoebe eggs out of its nest under the
porch". From that point on, Miss Sherman recorded all
instances of despoiled nests, eggs and young, and the particular species
she determined responsible. Regarding wrens, her observations led
her to conclude that it was the male, and most likely the unmated males,
that were so destructive to other species; the females reserving their
destructive tendencies for each other. She recorded violations by
several other species also, including the Blue jay, House sparrow,
Bronzed grackle, Catbird, Cowbird, and European starling.
As a scientist dedicated to facts and truth, Miss Sherman conducted
research using skins, including the head and bill, and House sparrow
eggs, to determine the precise size and shape of holes made by forcing
the various beaks against the eggs. From this research she could
ascertain whether wrens (which never produced holes larger than 3 mm) or
other birds were the culprits. As time went on, she indeed found
the wren accountable for the vast majority of the destruction.
The dilemma was growing for Miss Sherman, who still found endearing
qualities in the wren, as the following journal entry shows: "This
afternoon I found four young wrens. They certainly are attractive
and amusing little imps, with long dark down and open pale yellow
mouths. They would be a joy if one could forget the evil of their
grown-up days. On July 21 I found the shell of the Black-billed
Cuckoo's egg that had the small holes in it. The holes and the
long narrow slits seem to prove that a Wren was the frightful devil that
thrust its sharp bayonet into the egg."
Miss Sherman also recorded the many species consistently ravaged by
the House wren. Sadly, the list is long and was not made up only
of other cavity-nesting birds, but seemed to include all species.
She listed Phoebe, Eastern bluebird, Mourning dove, Black-billed and
Yellow-billed cuckoos, Northern flicker, Downy and Hairy woodpeckers,
White-breasted nuthatch, Song sparrow, Vesper sparrow, Chipping sparrow,
Grasshopper sparrow, Bewick's wren, Tufted titmouse, Black-capped
chickadee, Catbird, Brown thrasher, Veery, Cardinal, Robin, Barn
swallow, Purple martin, Baltimore oriole, Warbling vireo, Bobolink,
Traills flycatcher, and Common yellowthroat. Even the Short-billed marsh
wren (Sedge wren), whose habitat was completely unlike that of the House
wren, was not immune. "The song seems to be dying in the throat of
the Short-billed Marsh Wren", wrote Miss Sherman; and the species
was harassed until it was driven off.
Althea Sherman pulled down her wren houses. The wrens then destroyed
the families of Downy and Hairy woodpeckers, flickers, bluebirds, and
others, securing the cavities for themselves and teaching Miss Sherman
first hand of their propensity for retaliation. She fought for the rest
of her life to reduce the numbers of House wrens breeding on her
property. And she made it her mission to educate and inform others
about the character of the House wren and the folly of erecting wren
houses. She maintained that the countless boxes, assembled in
nearly every school in the nation, given away at fairs and church
socials, nailed up or hanging in almost every garden, farm and city,
were providing an irreversible advantage to a species which, out of
balance, lives at the expense of all other species in the area. A
pair of House wrens in an acre may result in little or no distress to
their own or other species. Five to ten pairs in that same area,
however, can result in a profound alteration in the scheme of things,
only to benefit an already hardy species that needs no such help.
"When Miss Althea Sherman's paper on the House Wren was read
before the Iowa Ornithological Union, at Ames, in 1924, it aroused such
an incredulous protest that only her undisputed reputation as an
accurate and seasoned bird student enabled her observations to receive
the consideration that was their due." This quote, from
Bird-Lore May/June 1925, gives just a hint of the controversy which
erupted when the same paper was published in that journal. In an
attempt to educate, Miss Sherman, probably inadvertently, launched the
"Great Wren Debate", which played out on the pages of
scientific, ornithological and the popular press for years to
come. "The Problem of the House Wren" elicited heated
responses and testimony from ordinary citizens through leading
ornithologists. Articles had been published twenty years earlier
regarding the destructive temperament of the House wren and these were
recalled. Readers were admonished to consider these findings and
to heed the warnings that learned men of science had offered two decades
earlier. Indeed, Miss Sherman held herself accountable for not
attending to these warnings when putting up the wren boxes on her own
property. Scores of observations and experiences with wrens were
submitted and began to spill across the pages of Bird-Lore.
Some of the response was supportive of the House wren and disclaimed
any destructive behavior. Some more clearly substantiated Miss
Sherman's position and went even further, with research results
including bill hole measurements and banding, which proved that female
wrens also destroyed other species' eggs. Another article by Miss
Sherman, entitled "Down With the House Wren Boxes" appeared in
The Wilson Bulletin several months later and further fanned the flames,
spreading the debate to other publications.
In preparation for her case, Miss Sherman had searched through 552
scientific and ornithological publications. In the last pages of
her wren journal she included a bibliography containing 114 articles and
not including her own vast research or the letters she received in
response to her articles. Judging from letters which were
published and from notations in her journals, the majority of written
responses substantiated her findings and lauded her courage for exposing
the truth and challenging the "sweet" reputation of
"little Jenny Wren".
The greater controversy, however, was an emotional one. Those
who were entirely ignorant of the destructive tendencies of House wrens,
or worse, those who admired the wren and would not allow their beliefs
to be challenged, attacked Miss Sherman. Her ornithological skills
and observation techniques were challenged and criticized. She was
ridiculed by some, lambasted on an emotional level and, profoundly
worse, she was discounted by others. Where she was invited to
speak before scientific societies, her research on other species was
still valued, but her research on the House wren (which was equally
comprehensive and thorough) was ignored or avoided. Miss Sherman
was a woman in a field solidly dominated by men. She was
self-taught and she was dedicated, diligent, and proud. By this
time in her life Althea Sherman had long ago achieved national and
international acclaim and recognition as a respected scientist and,
possibly more important, there was self-recognition for her decades of
research and accomplishments. The emotional reaction by the
public, and even by some of her peers, to an issue which she felt
profoundly threatened the welfare of so many other species of songbirds
stirred feelings of great sorrow and bitterness within her. In
journal entries and letters to Margaret Morse-Nice, it is clear that she
took these attacks personally, and resented them, but more importantly,
she felt the ignorance and refusal to listen further doomed her efforts
to protect other birds.
"Speaking for myself it must be confessed that I may have sinned
against my small bird neighbors when, for purposes of study, there has
been tolerance of two nestings each of Screech Owls and Sparrow Hawks
[Kestrels]. But there is only one sin that causes constant
mourning in sackcloth and ashes, that causes me to lie awake nights
visioning the future condition of our country with its bird population
consisting mainly of those undesirable aliens, the Starling, the English
[House] Sparrow, together with the Grackles and the House Wrens:
that sin was the putting up of bird houses and allowing them
to be occupied by House Wrens."
-Althea R. Sherman Wilson Bulletin, September 1925.
"Additional Evidence Against the House Wren"
Copies of the "Wren Debate" articles gathered to date are
available from Barbara Boyle of the
Johnson County Songbird Project,
1320 Grabin Rd. NW,
Oxford, IA 52322.
319-628-4824
Note: Althea Sherman was born in National, Iowa in 1853. She
attended Upper Iowa University and received her degree as a professional
teacher of art and taught art for 22 years. Although Althea was
self-taught in the area of bird research, she did pioneering work in the
study of the life-styles of several bird species and became nationally
and internationally known for her studies. Seventy years later,
much of her work is considered to be the most complete research compiled
on several bird species. Althea Sherman's research on wrens is
particularly interesting. It is a fact that wrens are the number
one problem on a bluebird trail, and "bluebirders" have been
aware of the wren problem for quite some time.However, little attention
has been given to how the over population of wrens is affecting the many
songbird species that nest and feed in our backyards.
Afterword
The time frame of the above article was 1925 or before. The dire
warnings of Althea Sherman and others are more significant now, some 70
years later. The House wren is everywhere, in open habitat where
it was not previously found, and is still breeding in staggering numbers
(5-12 eggs per brood, usually two and occasionally three broods per
season). Wren boxes are everywhere, still the favored grade school
project nationwide, and available at reasonable prices in stores
everywhere. The House wrens fill most of the houses provided for
them, and many, many more, displacing bluebirds, tree swallows,
chickadees, titimice, woodpeckers, and more. The years between Miss
Sherman's observations and now have provided more opportunities to prove
her theories and it is so. There is hardly a bluebirder anywhere
who would not rail against the wren and tell stories of mayhem and
sorrow. Any serious "birder" or "lister"-one who
seeks to locate and identify species- will confirm their countless
numbers in all regions. And the reluctance to believe the destructive
behavior of House wrens is as prevalent today as in Miss Sherman's
time. Jenny Wren? No! There have been decades to study or even
chance upon the materials available in regard to this species. Yet
there is widespread ignorance. Is there unwillingness to look at the
truth? To explore and share observations right here in our own
backyards? It is time to once again open up the "Great Wren
Debate". It is this writer's opinion that House wrens not be
allowed to nest in boxes, not be so overwhelmingly helped by humans,
that the popularization of wren boxes in schools and elsewhere be
stopped and that robin platforms be built instead. Maybe even more
assertive steps should be taken. The subject is a delicate one because
there is such enjoyment of this little bird. But is there not
enjoyment of the others too? And it is a sensitive area because the
House wren is a protected species (should it be?) and it is illegal to
tamper. But are not all these houses a form of tampering? We
invite and encourage you to write (or call) and share your observations,
experiences, evidence (pro & con), and feelings on this
matter.
Barbara Boyle
10/02/02
