What to feed?

[hel1985]

unfortunitly i would have to disagree,rare birds will come in time as industry and houses close in..i mite recomend planting sum good 'wildlife friendly' plants and bushes i.e hawthorn,and mabe sum plants to atract the insects they eat...depends wat u want to bring in.

[Pippa]

Hi John,i agree with Hedgie that it's worth checking out the birds in your area.


I'm afraid i had to take my fat feeders down as i was inundated by so many Jackdaws , Crows and Starlings which i love but don't have the garden space for here and the poor tit family were getting none.

I only use Sunflower Hearts and fruit and i find all my visitors love them including the Bullfinches.Goldies are in the highest number here and up to around 30, but back home i didn't get any at all and we had a large mature garden, so just goes to show.It is all down to location.

Sparrows really like Sunflower hearts too,we started with a couple and have well over a dozen coming in now.

Anyway John,keep the food and water going and i,m sure the birds will keep coming and increase as mine have done this past 18 months.

[-John]

Just been round to the local shop and bought some shredded suet. Worked a treat! in 15 minutes, just on the table with the suet, we had 15 starlings at once, sparrow, blue tits back and forth, robins and a male blackbird bought his fledgling to the table for some food. Also the disruption attracted the goldies and greenfinches. Shows the right kind of food does work!

As for jackdaws, where I live, every night at dusk we have a migration of about 100 jackdaws in about 2 minutes from Richmond park. They obviously roost somewhere close!

I understand what you are saying about rare birds, but they are regularly in the area and many fly overs. Just got to attract them .

Sends me to bed on a happier note, thanks for all your guidance guys!

[Hedge Witch]

Excellent news John!

[smartie]

The busiest areas of my garden just now are the bird table, where I use a fairly ordinary seed mix supplemented sometimes with mealworms and bacon rinds, and the fat blocks, which are used by everything from blue tits to great spotted woodpeckers. I make sure one of the blocks is accessible from a branch so they don't have to hang, and that gets jays and thrushes as well as the smaller birds. One jay and a very large carrion crow also feed regularly from the table.

I do have a peanut feeder, but it doesn't get much use and I'm thinking of abandoning it. The tits prefer the sunflower seeds.

I get goldcrests in the garden in a large fir tree we have, but I've only once seen them at the feeders in that really cold snap we had in the winter.

[-John]

I do have woodpeckers in the area, but took the nuts down because began questioning whether it was wise to have them coming to the garden when i have blue tits nesting?

Theoretically, what would a nut feeder attract?

John

[Jenny W]

Woodpeckers are great fans of peanuts usually. I wouldn't worry so much about peanuts and Blue Tits nesting. If you offer them in wire mesh feeders generally the adult birds cannot get whole peanuts out. Also, in the breeding season the parents will feed the chicks natural food as much as possible - the chicks natural food is caterpillars and other invertebrates -adult birds will feed this over supplementray seed (although they themselves will take supplementary food sources during the summer)

[bobbarber]

Hello John, as has been said, birds disperse into other areas to set up breeding territories so you will not get as many as at other times of the year. If they do they will not hang about but fly off to feed their young in their own territory. Have you considered where you put the feeders? They should be positioned near shrubs or hedges to give them somewhere to hide when danger is about, but far enough away to prevent cats from jumping up. Which plants you grow can be an important, let some of them run to seed . Grow shrubs that bear berries in the Autumn . You didn`t mention water which is important throughout the year both for drinking and bathing,an upturned dustbin lid is fine. Fat balls are O.K., but remove the net as birds can get tangled in them. Good luck...Bob

[-John]

Thank you for all your ideas! I will try and implement them over the next few weeks

Cheers
John