Feed The Birds

Jacque I like this blog.

Yesterday I put up a globe-shaped squirrel-proof feeder which is on a pole, so the whole thing is shaped like a lollipop.

I've fixed this feeder near the back of my house so that I can see it easily from indoors. Might have to move it in the summer.

There are no squirrels in my garden, but the feeder is to deter the starlings who chase away all the smaller birds. I have not forgotten the starlings who have their own feeders further down the garden.

I have three different bird baths, frequently used by blackbirds,collared doves and smaller birds.

It takes the little birds a while to work out how to enter the outer globe-shaped cage to reach the vertical tube of bird food within. As the colder weather arrives, I guess the birds will be more hungry, and small birds such as blue tits and sparrows will make more use of the feeder. :o)

I buy half-coconut shells from the poundshop. When the birds have finished them, I noticied I had loads of empty coconut shells hanging in my tree! SO, now when we cook meat, I pour the fat striaght into one of the coconut shells and sprinkle some peanuts and seeds into it. The birds love them! I also have a seed-feeder. I find fat balls don't seem very popular - I think the rain gets into them. I would love to get a niger-seed feeder - but they are SO expensive :-S

Great Stuff TT & Sid :) Any Suitable Meal Left Overs Go On To My Lawn 4 The Starlings TT so their not forgotten, I Have2 Different Coconut Feeders 2 Sarah & i Scrap My Old Grill Fat into these as we dont use Lard :) They do enjoy it dont they :)

HHhhhhhhhmmmm Silly Super Markets selling Bird Seed i agree totaly with you there Marguerite! iv read b4 on GOY that in Your Country your not 2 feed the Birds& can be Fined a High Sum Of Money If You Do So. I guess theres more food 4 your Countrys Birds being it never gets 2Cold/Froozen? :)

I have lots of feeders myself, lots of diferent seed, nuts, fatballs, my own fatcakes, etc, by the way what seeds do you mix together, if you look on my home page you will see how i make my fat cakes.

I love feeding birds and have even participated in the Cornell society North American bird count. I have had to cut back because of the price but I still make suet and peanut butter cakes to feed in the winter. I have a area of natural growth at the back of the property which draws in some rarer varieties of birds. I love watching them!

i put my feeders on trees ,climbing plants and trellis also have 2 bird tables and baths ,use a mixture of loose seed ,fat balls bought & homemade and any scraps I think are suitable alhougth dogs tend to raid some times.lol.Tend not to use peanuts my birds wont eat them dont know why cos buy from pet stall.As winter progresses I coax birds nearer to patio for my own pleasure blackbirds get so tame they will look in patio window and ask cheeky beggars.

ive loads of feeders around the garden, love watching the birds come in every day.
good blog jacque, esp about making sure the birds have clean water. and your right it doesnt have to be an expensive bird bath, i have an old ceramic bowl filled with water in the garden and was watching today as the birds took turns bathing in it, ill try get a photo of them some time

Sounds great Eileen cant wait 2 see what Feeders u have :)

most of the feeders are on pics on my home page , including the monkey nut ones i made lol

Off 2 check out ur Monkey Nut Master Piece Now Eileen :)

lol ok jacque

Great Jacque the birds will love it and be a source of great entertainment for you.Amazing how the different food sources are shared collared doves prefer the corn base , starlings and blackbirds the suet pellets , robins the mealworms ( they all go mad for them ) and the smaller birds the finer seeds.

So despite initial flocks it does seem to get shared.
In winter months there is the chance of a visitor such as a brambling ( similar to chaffinch but lovely apricot colour )
Siskins ( similar to greenfinch but smaller with black band on head and slender beak) or redwings and fieldfares.

Of course you right about water and its essential and surprising just how many like to bathe despite the chilly weather.Have left a few water hyacinths in the pond as goldfinches like to float on them.

Its important to clean feeding areas regularly to prevent build up of moist mouldy food and the spread of trichomonas which can affect birds feet and lead to deformity even loss of legs.

Mixing foods is a great idea as it certainly works out cheaper we use a cheap base like you then add all those tasty tit bits from individual packs .

As Im sure youre aware Jacque once you start then you ll soon get your own fan club who come to depend on you.
Its essential that anyone feeding birds continues to do so on a regular basis.As Lincslass says some get quite bold
and get quite cheeky.

Jacque, I am a market trader who sells wild bird feed. I have been doing it for 10 years now, and therefore it is something I know a little about!! :) I have 23 different types of wild bird feed, which covers many different types of seed, nuts, fatty foods, mealworms and mealworm mixes. For my birds I put out a small seed mix with no wheat in it on the tables with added sunflower hearts and peanut granules, a robin/songbird mix on the ground and in a tray on a pole, sunflower hearts in feeders and fat balls....but I put these in a dish on the ground! If I hang them they don't get eaten! I put a peanut feeder out but very few get eaten, I don't get any of the tit family and they seem to be the biggest eaters of nuts. I have 3 bird tables, 4 hanging feeders and a bird bath.
The varied stories I get from all my customers are interesting as although we all get the same species of birds in different areas they go for different foods and what one persons birds eat another's don't!

Your so Right Bonkers about the Regulars :) I feed My Birds Straight after Summer,Cats, Mr Hash&the Girls so their all waiting for me in the mornings :)

Yes BB, many people don't realize the importance of feeding year round. By supplying food in the winter, come Spring birds will nest in the vicinity because they know they can find food. So if you then stop putting food out they struggle to feed themselves and their brood with fatal consequences.

I've just started feeding the birds, something I've wanted to do for years but never got round to.

I bought two ordinary seed feeders, a peanut feeder, a nyjer seed feeder and a cage for fat balls. The fat balls have been popular with starlings (not my favourite birds), the seed feeders get alot of sparrows, the peanuts mostly seem to appeal to starlings again and the nyjer feeder hasn't been discovered by any finches so far.

I did mix some mealworm into the seed in one feeder in the hope that the robin might find them, but I realise I need a table of some kind for robins and blackbirds.

Our pond is proving popular for drinks and bathing, very entertaining to watch.

I only have one bird table, but I hang different feeders from it and put food onto it as well. Also a terracotta saucer for water. The birds bathe in the shallow bit of the stream. I can't put food on the ground, though, due to our four-legged 'stomach on legs' who hoovers up any bird food dropped over the side!!! I do have a niger seed holder and recently have had up to 5 Goldcrests at once on it! Also a peanut holder and one for fatballs. Lots of different birds come.

Guess what! There was a KINGFISHER in the garden today! Husband saw it recently, then I did this morning! I was so thrilled! Of course, it was by the stream. It didn't stay to have its photo taken, sadly.

Oh wonderful Spritz a beautiful bird - they have favourite perches so if theres a branch that bends over your stream thats what they love and will return regularly.

You mean goldfinches dont you ? on your nyger seed .

oh how lucky Spritz, im sure he will be back again and hopefully let you take his pic

I thought about puting out feed for birds when we first moved here but, quite frankly, they could teach us a thing or two about living off the land. Plus, of course, the feral cats would be a problem for them! The wall holding back part of the mountain from falling into our garden has a bank of wild flowers and grasses and is often heaving with flocks of Chaffinches, Goldfinches, Greenfinches etc, and the Black Redstarts that were born on a beam over our balcony last Spring regularly hunt around the garden. There is a patch of wild ground outside our back door where a cabbage self-seeded - the cabbage leaves are picked by our neighbour for her chickens, the finches grab anything with legs amongst the flowers and, as soon as the seeds appear we get small flocks of Serins camoflaged amongst the foliage making a meal of the seeds.

In this region there are Vulture feeding stations! When a farmer has a death amongst his herd, as long as it was from old age and not from some disease, he transports it to a designated area and the Vultures deal with it. Now that's what I call feeding the birds - and for less than "Twopence a Bag." Job done!

Thanks, BB, yes GoldFINCHES. It was after my bedtime. Sorry! We'll be watching out for our new bright blue friend now we know he/she is around...

Nariz - YUK - but how practical!

Wow! Spritz A King Fisher ! How Fantastic is that :) It`d be Great if u got a Pic Of Him/Her would`nt it? Stunning Coloured Birds you Lucky Lady you :)X

What color are European Kingfisher? We have a green variety here. Stunning birds, you are truly lucky.

Just moved to a house with a garden so for the first time ever can feed the birds. A friend bought me a bird bath and a feeder specially for nyger seed. The goldfinch took a while to find it but now 5 or 6 visit together. Greenfinch seem to like peanuts and the starlings love home made fat balls. I love watching them in the bath - they almost queue up to bathe, sometimes 4 or 5 in together. I also have one magpie, one green woodpecker (who just pecks things out of the grass), and a robin and blackbird. Unfortunately I also seem to have some newcomers - Parakeets - and they overpower most of the other birds. Oh, and a lovely Jay.

U get Parakeets Ginellie? Where abouts in uk do u live Very South by sounds of it :)

The London parks have Parakeets living in them, Jacque - I posted a photo of two of them a while back. I'm talking about SW London - Richmond and Bushey Parks, Marble Hill etc. When we go to our daughter's, we always see and hear them!

OMG really Spritz? i never knew they were living there :O il go check ur pics now back in mo :)

Yes there are hundreds of Parakeets in the London Parks - especially Richmond. At the moment I only have a few, and would like to keep it that way. They try to get at the peanuts but because of their curved beaks don't get too many from the feeder. Apparently they usually feed on fruit but will accept other foods in the winter. I don't want to encourage them - though they are very beautifull.
I would also love to encourage a hedgehog to take up residence, but not sure how. Lots of special boxes for sale in garden centres but I'm sure hedgehogs can be tempted by less expensive housing. Any ideas?

Ring-necked Parakeets are in SE London too - I've seen them in Greenwich and Crystal Palace Park and they have also flown over my garden although they are more numerous in the SW. They are definitely on the increase. IIRC my parents have even seen them in Thanet - the RSPB say they are in Surrey, Kent and Sussex.

~there were some last time we were at Kew Gardens!~

I was intrigued by Margaret's comment.

"In fact. it is illegal to feed native birds in this country,"

I think I can understand, and with a few exceptions I think I agree.

The vulture feeding station is a bloody good idea. We do that to a degree, when we return culled salmon from the fish hatchery. Eggs have been harvest and they are dead. They are placed way upstream and bears, coyote, cougar and raptors have their feast. Original fish populates used to do that naturally. Now we do it artificially.

What happens when we stop? Same for bird feeding.
I do not, and have one of the highest bird populations of any garden around here. I plant bird feeding plants, I provide wild hiding places (read unkempt) for them to hide and bread in. Many bird nests. No feeders.

If we have an arctic blast I do. Especially the water bit. That is a point we are good Samaritans and provide help. When we dropped to 0 degree F. one year I had two SNOW GEESE drop on my roof. This is Snow geese. They were done in. I fed and watered them for a few days, and off they went.

One other IRK of mine is the luring them in so one can observe them. I worked for one such bird feeding nut. She placed her feeders directly by her windows so she could see her lovely finches. It was left to the gardener to bury all the dead birds that cracked their heads against her windows. But she LOVED birds. BULL!

I finally convinced her to hang reflective tape, weighted down in front of the window to warn them off. This helped. I still buried birds.

Finally, all the accumulated bird seed droppings fell to the ground. Other birds feasted on this fecal contaminated food source. In WA. we ended up with a real epidemic and crash amongst two bird populations. All because of bird feeding.

I am against it. Provide shelter, water and habitat. If you do the feeding thing. Clean up EVERY day, not just wait until the gardener comes weekly.to shovel the stuff up.
Is this a RANT. Yes, because this is not a single incident

I like the coconut cup idea, the fat encrusted seeds. I do not respect anyone that hangs up bird feeders close to their house and their windows. This woman was a cat lover as well, and I think part of her entertainment was to watch the cats ogle the birds. VERY TWISTED

As you may guess I no longer work for her.