Loggerhead Shrikes eat a wide variety of insects, reptiles, rodents, and other small animals. They impale them for several reasons. First, they lack the strong feet and talons that hawks and owls use for tearing apart prey, so impaling a mouse makes it easier to rip into bite-sized chunks. Impaling is also used for storing food that they will eat later. This has the added benefit of giving time for some toxins, such as those in Monarch Butterflies, to degrade, making them edible. It is also thought to be part of the mating process, showing females that the male can be a good provider.