Feeding Wild Birds

Feeding wild birds can be quite an eclectic practice. This is wild birds have different food preferences. Some eat bugs while others favor seeds or tomatoes. Other wild birds like hummingbirds wish to suck up sugar water.

To make feeding wild birds even more advanced their diet can change from season to season. As an example some birds may eat insects for almost all of the year but then switch to berries in the wintertime when there are less creepy crawlies around. Here's a temporary guide to feeding wild birds. If you'd like to draw in : Blackbirds - Spread millet out on a platform feeder. Bluebirds - Spread millet out on a platform feeder with raisins, dried fruit and fruit remains. They can also eat from a suet ball and enjoy suet balls covered with peanut butter. Jays - Spread a platform feeder with corn, peanuts and sunflower seeds. They also enjoy a nice ball of suet. Cardinals - Spread sunflower seeds, peanuts or fruit on a platform feeder. They may also eat from a suit ball or suet feeder. Cedar Waxwings - Spread a platform feeder with dried or fresh pieces of fruit. Chickadees - These wild birds need a tube feeder with black oil sunflower seeds. The will also feed from a suet feeder or a platform or tube feeder supplied with peanuts or thistle seeds. They can also feed from suet balls or tree bark spread with peanut butter. Doves - Spread millet, corn and peanuts on a platform feeder. Finches - Finches feed best from a tube feeder stuffed with black sunflower seeds or a platform feeder with peanuts.

They will also eat safflower seeds and thistle seeds ( sometimes called niger ) Flickers - Flickers enjoy suet balls or pieces smeared with peanut butter, or you can smear the peanut butter on a tree. Grackles - Spread a platform feeder with peanuts Grosbeaks - they'll feed on sunflower or safflower seeds from a tube feeder or a platform. Hummingbirds - These wild birds eat fructose so they need a hanging nectar feeder crammed with sugar water. They may also eat peanut butter smeared on tree bark. Juncos - Spread a platform feeder with corn and peanuts Mockingbirds - Mockingbirds prosper best feeding from a platform feeder crammed with fresh or dried fruit. Nuthatches - Feed these wild birds with a suet feeder or a tube feeder stuffed with black sunflower seeds. Orioles- These songbirds feed from a nectar feeder stuffed with sugar water and on pieces of fresh or dried fruit. Pheasants - Feed these giant birds with platform feeder crammed with corn. Pigeons - Fill a platform feeder with millet or corn. Pine Siskins -This wild bird feeds on thistle seeds. Quail - Fill a platform feeder with corn. Sparrows - These wild birds feed from a platform feeder crammed with millet or peanuts. They also enjoy millet, sunflower seeds, thistle seeds and corn. Tanagers - These songbirds favor a nectar feeder stuffed with sugar water and dried or fresh fruit. Titmice - These miniscule birds favor a tube feeder crammed with black oil sunflower seeds or peanuts. They will also dine off platform feeder with peanuts or on tree bark covered with peanut butter. Woodpeckers - They enjoy fruit, dried fruit, suet balls and tube feeders crammed with peanuts or sunflower seeds. They also enjoy suet or tree bark smeared with peanut butter. Wrens- These small birds do best feeding from a suet ball or suet filled feeder. They may also eat suet balls or tree bark which has been smeared with peanut butter.

As an element of your regiment of feeding wild birds you might also want to provide them with a little bit of grit. Grit is just fine grains of sand. You may buy pet bird grit or make your own by grinding up eggshells.

Eggshells also supply wild birds with calcium that they need to lay their bird eggs in the spring.

Birds consume fine grains of grit to help them digest seeds and peanuts. This is particularly crucial if you are feeding wild birds in the wintertime when the ground is covered in snow and the dust that they usually eat to provide their gizzards with grit is rare. A deficiency of freely available grit is why wild birds can often look a bit unhealthy in the wintertime season. The wild birds will generally appreciate it if you mix a little of grit in with their food as it eases their digestion.