Northern Shrikes normally prey on small birds and mammals, and large insects which they capture and impale on twigs, thorns and handy barbed wire.  On Sable Island, small mammals are not available, but shrikes have captured, skewered and partly consumed, warblers, Ipswich and Zonotrichia sparrows, and thrushes.  Sometimes the impaled prey is the first clue that a shrike has arrived on the island.

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