Now is more important than ever to go out and top up your Bird feeders. With the cold temperatures and it being in the middle of winter, the food available to birds will be scarce. Birds are active creatures and therefore needs lots of energy and nutrition to survive. On Average a bird can make up to 200 – 300 trips in search of food every day. Birds like to eat slugs, snails and caterpillars; all of which are common garden pests. So with that in mind it would be good practice to keep birds on your side and keep them coming back to your garden in search of food. Of course if birds come to your garden looking for slugs and snails in winter, they are not likely to find any and that is why it is important to fill Bird feeders with bird peanuts.
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- starling
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- blackbirds
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- Great tit
Winter can be a dull lifeless place but one thing that will certainly liven up the place is a cackle of hungry birds. In the depths of winter I find myself refilling both my Peanut bird food feeder and my fat balls bird feeder. I find a wide range of birds making use of my feeders throughout the year but winter is always the most eventful, so much so that I would feel bad if I was to go more than a day without refilling the feeders.
The range of birds that frequent my garden include; the startling, this is probably the most common bird I see. Followed by crows, unfortunately these big fellows need to eat too, and eat they do! When these boyos come to my garden it’s not long before I’m back out topping up with more fat balls. One way to discourage crows from eating all the food is to place your peanut bird food inside the centre of a small tree. Position it so that it is surrounded and enclosed by the tree’s branches. This will mean only the smallest of birds can work their way into the food, leaving the hungry crows to scavenge for the crumbs that fall to the floor. Other common birds have been Blackbirds, the solitary Robin, sparrows and rarely do I see Magpies, or Magpie.
The use of a bird feeder is not the only way to attract birds to your garden; you can also use bird boxes, bird tables and hanging bird tables to create habitats for your birds. You can plant fruit bushes such as raspberries, blueberries and gooseberries as these will provide additional food. But be warned fruit bushes are thorny and can grow out of control if you are not willing to maintain them. Another way to attract birds to your garden is to not have a cat – useless advice for those who have a cat, but maybe something to note for those considering getting a cat. But the best way to attract those birds and keep them coming back is to feed them regularly with birds peanuts, birds fat balls or birds seeds