Â鶹´«Ã½

WE MAY have lost nearly half of the migratory songbirds that filled the skies as little as 40 years ago, says distinguished ecologist Bridget Stutchbury. As pollinators and insect-eaters, songbirds play a crucial ecological role and are key biological indicators of environmental problems. Nevertheless, their survival continues to be threatened, largely by pesticides on their North American breeding grounds and in their tropical wintering haunts. Consumer action can help, Stutchbury argues. Buy organic, shade-grown coffee: monoculture plantations destroy the tropical forests vital to birds. Buy organic food, or ditch the North American crops that pose the greatest risk of pesticide…