Is everyone putting food out for the birds?

[mysarahlee]

It's so cold, the ground birds can't dig.

Chuck some leftover Christmas nuts out, or some seeds. I put 10 fat balls out and filled the seeds at 5pm yesterday and it's empty this morning.

Feed your local bird pals if you can, it's so cold.

I was feeding the birds, and had loads, including a Leucistic Blackbird, which I loved seeing. Next door’s cats don’t often stray into my garden as I have a dog, and I had no issue with the odd squirrel having a feed.
I, however, happened to glance out to see the most enormous rat tucking into some leftover pastry I’d put out. We’ve had rats in the loft before and I don’t want to encourage them back, so I stopped all ‘ground’ food.
I now only have a small hanging feeder.

We only get magpies and seagulls round here. The Magpies are rude and the Gulls need ASBOs. The Pigeons are actually quite tame and friendly. They come and sit on the bench with you and will even eat from your hand if offered.

I don't want to draw them within range of our cat but will take a look outside and see if I can put something out where the cat can't get to.

Derail... Why have mealworms got so expensive? Are mealworms the new mars bar measure of universal inflation? Also, where are the mealworm production factories? I'm fixated with wanting to see where they come from. They must produce them by the billion!

Not to be a downer on a lovely thread but do you all fully clean your bird feeders regularly to avoid spreading disease among bird populations? I listened to something about this a while back that said it was a real problem for some UK species (like seriously reducing their numbers) so it can actually be destructive to feed them if you don’t also keep on top of feeder hygiene to keep them safe. Which of course many people don’t, through lack of awareness or because it is a step too far in terms of hassle.

I wish I could remember the details but for those of you doing such kind things for the birds, if like me you didn’t know that, it may be worth looking up.

I'm so soft with the birds that I now let my asparagus plants grow out into big, tall fronds for the red berries, which the small birds seem to like.

For seagulls, over a cold period like we are having now, I will often prepare a nutritional bouillabaisse as a bit of a treat.

I tend to follow Raymond Blanc's recipe as I find it more traditional that some of the versions now popping up on Jamie's, Nigella's or the BBC sites. As I have a most gorgeous clifftop sea house with views over the rugged Atlantic, on a Saturday morning I love to create a delicious base before adding in some hake, bream, langoustine, crab and other delicious shellfish and white fish types. I crack the kitchen door open a little, and the seagulls having smelt the delicious broth gently simmering throughout the morning, will gently land on the wooden galley running around the first floor level. I cut up some rustic bread, maybe a little more than I need, for dipping in the broth.

After sinking most of a bottle of Picpoul de Pinet as I cook, I will throw some of the bread scraps over to the seagulls to warm them through a bit before my friends arrive for lunch. Their little faces as they watch me and my friends eating the rich, tasty bouillabaisse, makes me thankful I am not a storm petrel or a wandering albatross or something.

We (quite small gardens but very rural village) don't suffer from squirrels or rats (probably all the terriers we own!) and our birds range from sparrows, blue tits through to woodpeckers - and the occasional kestrel and sparrowhawk. I love sitting at my kitchen table and looking out at the feeders full of birds. Especially when the sparrows in summer come to the pond which is right outside my window, and spend ages splashing about or one of the tits perches on the tree outside and peers in through the window at me!

Son has provided some shallow water in an old sledge and a grateful pigeon has just had a drink and a bath!

Yes good point. I put my feeders in boiling water and give them a scrub every couple of weeks since bird flu started in the news a few years ago. When we had ducks and chickens this was talked about a lot on keeper forums.

I out some out today and I've seen a tit and a brown bird, maybe a sparrow? And loads of fighting pigeons.

No I've got cats!

We do have cats but they are older now, barely go outside at this time of year, and have always been rubbish hunters, I hang the feeders carefully in places which aren’t cat accessible and only sprinkle on the ground in the worst weather and in a wide open space where they can see the cats coming. The cats enjoy sitting inside watching them but that’s as far as they go. I don’t feed the birds in warmer weather when the cats are out, didn't when our neighbours had cats (now moved away) and didn’t when ours were younger and more agile.

Sorry can I just shout out for the magpies. These are amazing birds, so clever and funny, brilliant for keeping your lawn free from leather jackets and their numbers are declining! They need to eat to and the circle of life means they will sometimes take eggs and chicks, usually from inexperienced parents building their nests in the wrong place - they will learn and build the next one somewhere less accessible! Magpies are not bastards and they are just doing what comes naturally.

We feed them all year round. Well, DH does and spends more on the birds than he does me I think! It's lovely to see them all.
We've got a fairly long garden, so we put a feeder near the big weeping willow tree at the bottom that the squirrels tend to go for, so they don't usually come up to the food nearer to the house. They need feeding too though!

The goldfinches love the seedeheads on the verbena boniarensis and the la ender too so I don’t cut them back until March. I cut bits off and put them on the bird table sometimes so I can see them from the window.

I don't because I have cats. It would do more harm than good.

My garden is fairly "wild" with lots of berries, seeds and nuts about though

Apples quarters and sultanas for the blackbirds, peanuts on the ground and in a feeder on the tree.

Had to stop fat balls after spotting an enormous brown rat hanging off the fat ball holder which is such a shame as the birds loved them. 😕

Yep, feeding the birds and we have a pair of blackbirds, robins and blue tits and sparrows, starlings and wrens and a thrush recently too as we've been digging over the garden and they've got lots of worms to fetch out. It's such a small amount of money and effort for such a lot of joy. We have a lot of cats too but the fat feeders are on the end of one of our washing lines so the cats have no chance, we also have large shrubs near the food source so they've got cover and an old galvanized animal trough for water. If you have the space, it's wonderful 😊

I can't, I'm afraid. It would be like providing a buffet for my cats. I do feed water birds though.(with the right stuff, before anyone starts!)

My bird feeder stand has about 5 hanging feeders and this winter it has brought me huge joy (I know that sounds trite but I've been having a bit of shitty time on cancer crappy treatment and fatigue fogginess is well suited to watching my bird feeders being used).

In the morning at about 7am the little sparrow/wrens appear first.
By breakfast time it's the wood pigeons.
The magpies (5 of them regular fly in) and crows (about 6 of them) put in an appearance but the wood pigeons hound them away. They sit on a nearby chimmey warching.

There's shrubs under my feeding stand so the little birds hop in and out getting crumbs

The little tits and the 2 robins are here by mid-day and pop in and out for the rest of the day. Afternoon is squirrel time. There's 2 - there might be a scrap if appear at same time.

There's some food hanging in my holly tree which the little birds can access but the bigger birds gate it because they can't get through the prickles.

They aren't interested in the meal worms or suet this year. They all want the seeds and nuts.

Feeders are cleaned about every 2 months but need to improve that.

We've got peckish brand feeders, the tops screw on so they might keep squirrels out we never get any so can't say for sure, they do keep the clever crows out,the pesky devils were nicking two out of each one of our fat ball feeders every time they were filled up until we got these but now they can't open them.

Well, I got a closer look at one bird and it's definitely a great tit, so I reckon that I have a mixture of those and blue tits. Hoping to see coal tits - we used to get them.

I always feed the birds in the winter. I have a house cat who loves to watch them out the window as do I, so it keeps us both out of trouble while feeding the local wildlife.

You probably have got coal tits visiting as well but they are lightening fast and hard to spot sometimes