Woodpecker birdfood
9 years ago
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What type of birdfood?
Comments (5)the problem with some mixes is the filler ingredients. You can buy a 40 lb bag of bird seed for $10. Or a 7 lb bag of bird seed for $10 and you would probably find more actual food for your song birds in the 7lb bag. Avoid any blend that has milo, wheat, oats, grit, the infamous "grain products" rape seed, canary seed... Stick with mixes that have any of these in combination Sunflower seeds, peanuts, (some) White Proso Millet, Safflower, tree nuts, dried fruit. Any of these in a mix, without the other junk will do you just fine. Any mix you buy should have more sunflower seeds then anything else....See MoreHow do you control chaos at the bird feeder?
Comments (17)In my many many years of bird feeding, it's the 'unnamed small round seeds" that get kicked out. I used to put a row of feeders, tube platform and lantern at the edge of a garden that got lettuce and tomatoes in the summer. Every spring I would shovel out easily an inch of wet moldy icky seeds that had been kicked out while they were digging for the seeds they like. so now I only feed black oil sunflower, niger and suet cakes....with a handful of cracked corn tossed out now and then if the going gets hard....deep snow, long snow cover. Sparrows have a purpose, if only as Cooper's hawk food to keep them from murdering the cardinals. It is also my experience that most "new to feeding" bird feeding people mistake everything that isn't a cardinal, blue jay, chickadee or woodpecker as a "sparrow". Gold finches in winter garb are often called sparrows. Pine siskins are often called sparrows, rosy finches are often called sparrows....as are all the native sparrows which are labeled as nuisances. Rochesterroseman, it's pretty cruel to put out feeders and then when birds become dependent on them, take them in. If you have no feeders out, you will have no birds. Either you feed birds, sparrows, starlings and all or you don't. Not feeding because you have sparrows tells me that you have nothing that is favorable for birds other than sparrows, no open water, no fruit bearing trees or shrubs, no dense stands of shrubbery, no evergreens to shelter birds during the winter. and you are feeding seed that doesn't attract the birds you want to see. get some place for the birds to hide, feed a variety of foods....and wait. You can't expect to put out some suet and sunflower seed and a week later see cardinals and woodpeckers. It takes weeks and in some cases months for the birds to find the food source. Feeding the birds is fun....keep trying! They will bring a lot of joy to your winter days....and if you feed in the summer too, your winter population will be larger....See MoreFeeding Newbie - Resouces?
Comments (28)Some doves, well, the Eurasian collard doves specifically, are really no better than pigeons in my opinion. The come swooping in on my feeders in groups of a dozen or more, gobbling down everything they can get their beaks on. The sound they make is atrocious, their large size scares away the smaller songbirds, and to top if off, they are an introduced bird. To be honest, I can't really find any redeeming qualities about them. Well, there is one. They happen to be the prime target of my sharp-shinned friend, much to my delight. The mourning doves on the other hand are a welcome, if much less abundant, visitor....See MoreBirdfood question
Comments (9)Hi Pat. Thanks for the kind words in the other posting. Here are my thoughts on bird feeding. You can’t wrong with straight black oil sunflower seed. For years I only fed BOSS and suet (and suet nuggets), and I attracted a lot of birds with those two things. Both options are affordable and easy to find. For anyone new to bird feeding, I would tell them to skip mixes and buy straight BOSS. In my early days of feeding, I did buy the mixes, but I had a lot of waste under the feeders because the birds sifted through the “filler” and mostly went for the BOSS. So I like to buy straight BOSS now. It wasn’t until the last couple months that I really started adding a lot of new feed options (and this is because I started reading books and learned how much more the birds will eat). I started feeding Nyjer/thistle, safflower, peanuts, almonds, pecans, hulled sunflower chips/hearts (just means no shell), cracked corn, mealworms, millet, and treats (like nut & seed logs, specialty suet blocks, etc). I even bought some blackberries the other day on sale and have the in the freezer now. I’ll get them out later when food is really scarce. If you buy store bought mixes, avoid the ones that say “milo” especially if milo is listed as the first or second ingredient… Those are usually the cheaper brands with lots of “filler” aka “milo”… And be sure to read what the mixes include, it’s important to know that whatever is listed first means the bag contains the most of that particular item. Millet is fine to feed. I just bought a bag of millet at my local feed store. I buy in bulk and wait for sales. My local feed store sells everything I need, but sometimes I order mixes and peanuts online because it’s cheaper. My favorite online stores are DrsFoster&Smith and FleetFarm.com Here’s what I’m currently using in my feeders- Tube feeders contain 90% BOSS with 10% premium nut mix Thistle tube feeder - 100% thistle (birds go crazy at this feeder) Hopper style feeder – one contains only safflower (I wanted to know if they would eat it, and they are). Another hopper contains 90% BOSS with cracked corn and nuts mixed in. (My fav feeder) – Droll Yankees - Dorothy’s Cardinal Bird Feeder – http://drollyankees.com/product/dorothys-cardinal-bird-feeder/ (Found it on sale at Walmart for $25) it’s an open/fly thru style feeder – and every morning I put out my premium mix in this. I have two suet feeders.. I have a seed log feeder and I just put out a treat called “nutsie” http://www.fleetfarm.com/detail/pine-tree-farms-nutsie-classic-seed-log-40-oz-/0000000214011 I also have a mini open feeder that contains 100% thistle I have a couple ground feeders too with stuff for the doves and ground feeders. My husband says I've gone nuts with the birds... hahaha But I remind him, he was the one who told me years ago that "once you start feeding them, you can't stop" hahaha so I tell him I can't stop since he told me that :)...See More- 9 years ago
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