Plenty of emergency supplies

These Ivy berries will provide incredibly nutritious meals for the birds along our lane later in the winter. I was looking at the hedge there today - over a very short distance there were clumps of Ivy with all the berries stripped, some with jet black, ripe berries that were partly eaten and plants like this with berries still needing to ripen. I've not noticed this before, but I guess it's a wonderful mechanism for ensuring a longer supply of food right through to early spring and making it more likely that the maximum number of berries will be consumed with the seed passing through a bird's gut to make it ready to germinate in the late spring. Clever stuff, nature!