Pigeons keep eating squirrel food.

[OohImBlindedByTheLights]

I have a family of squirrels who come into our garden daily to eat from the pot of nuts I leave out for them.

I have a covered bird table and a squirrel hotel feeder (google it - so cute), however, the bloody wood pigeons keep eating everything! There are up to 6 at a time in my garden. I've left bird seed out for them but they always go for the nuts first then their seed.

Is there any recommendations on how I can keep the pigeons from eating all the squirrel food?

I'm trying to attract birds other than bloody wood pigeons to my garden, but so far no success.

I have a covered bird table too but it doesn't make any difference. Perhaps it doesn't help that I have a cocker spaniel who will sometimes bark at birds in the garden. Only the wood pigeons are daft enough to come back for more and they are just big, greedy clumsy and flappy idiots.

So I have no answers, but would be interested if anyone else has.

Leave nuts out for the pigeons too in their feeder?

I stopped feeding the birds because the squirrels were eating all the food.

@RubyandPearl I do, I also mix the nuts in with their bird seed but they always eat the squirrel food first then theirs. Any other birds that come along they chase them off! They also leave big clumpy shit everywhere too!!!

Try a hanging feeder on a tree branch - the pigeons won't be able to hang onto it but the squirrels will. Pigeon poo is horrible - my car got covered last week and the poo survived an automated car wash!

the pigeons won't be able to hang onto it They will

Every feeder I've had they just cling on to and somehow manage to eat all the food. It's bugging me like mad and they keep fighting off other birds when they come into the garden!

If they are grey squirrels then they are vermin - you shouldn't be feeding them.

Mere my pigeons don't! They wander around aimlessly on the ground, hoping that somebody else will drop crumbs from the feeders! Maybe my pigeons are extra dim (which would be saying a lot).

Grey squirrels are just rats with good PR. Pigeons are just flying rats. Just don't leave food out for either of them.

@Londonmummy66

Grey squirrels are just rats with good PR. Pigeons are just flying rats. Just don't leave food out for either of them.

I agree, I stopped putting out seed for the birds when I also found I was encouraging real rats . Shame, I was getting a good selection of smaller birds who don’t come any more #ungratefulcupboardlovetits. I only put out a bit of grated cheese and a handful of mealworms now, they are eaten so quickly by the sparrows and the robins that nothing else gets a look in. Except the magpies who I have to deter.

Pigeons will eat squirrel food, squirrels will eat bird food - mice and rats eat both. That's nature.

If they are grey squirrels then they are vermin Vermin doesn't have a legal definition in the UK. Whetehr you feed them or not is entirely up to you.

Maybe my pigeons are extra dim (which would be saying a lot). They really are the physical manifestation of "bird brained", aren't they?