Just hanging about

In an earlier post I wrote about how we encouraged a diverse range of birds to visit our garden. I described the sort of bird tables that we had so now I want to move on to the hanging feeders.

We like to position our feeders with three considerations. 

1. Can we watch visiting birds from the house?
2. Will the birds be happy to feed there?
3. Is the feeder safe from cats?

We have one of those feeding stations with various hooks attached from which to hang feeders.

It's developed a bit of a bend due to being blown over in a strong wind. This I find visually annoying but the birds don't seem to care. The three hanging feeders contain black sunflower seeds, a general seed mix and niger seeds. 

The niger seeds are in a normal seed feeder which isn't recommended but we found our bird visitors didn't take to the feeders specially designed for niger seeds. The niger seeds are second choice of food for our flock of goldfinches and have also attracted siskins. 

Birds often wait on the roof of the bird table for a turn on the feeders and also some scattered seed lands there providing another feeding opportunity. You can also see a flat wire tray just behind the green feeder on which more food can be placed. The globe on top was used for fat balls but we found the starlings could get in and made short work of any fat balls placed in there so we looked for a container that they couldn't access and found this.

The only problem is that now the sparrows have taken over and make short work of the fat balls instead of the starlings. This cage hangs from the magnolia tree next to the house. Also hanging from the magnolia tree are three other feeders.

One contains peanuts and the other metal cylinder with holes is for buggy or fruity nibbles.

Buggy nibbles are bits of suet with insect or fruit fragments mixed in.

Then there is the extremely popular sunflower heart feeder. This seems to be everyone's all time favourite food and the feeder is the source of much squabbling.

This feeder can be calibrated so that the heavier birds can't use it and ours is set so that either three sparrows or goldfinches can feed at any one time. The birds seem to have worked this out and will repel any extra birds that try and feed causing the hopper to close. A queue will form in the tree waiting for an opportunity to hop onto the ring.

Another hanging feeder is the piece of birch trunk. These were being sold off for £1 at a nearby RSPB reserve after they had coppiced some birch trees. 

At the moment this is empty but as winter sets in I'll fill the holes with a mixture of the various bird foods held together with lard. I'll also hang up some half coconuts filled with the same mixture.

One coconut half will be tied to the magnolia tree so that robins and blackbirds can gain access so they don't get left out.

The hanging shells are great for the tit family although other birds manage to access them. Starlings - having the wrong sort of feet - aren't supposed to be able to cling but ours can!

I've bought lard in readiness so now all I need is to get mixing.

I've a 'recipe for fat cake on my website here. It's important to use a hard fat for bird cake as soft spreading type fat can clog the birds feathers - also using fat left over from cooking meat can give birds food poisoning.

One type of food that I should have mentioned in my last post was another favourite namely soft-bill mix. We buy a mix called Golden Chorus which is specially produced for birds that don't tend to eat seeds, such as blackbirds and robins. Various other similar mixes are available which usually contain, insects bits, berries and maybe honey too. As well as the birds being fans, hedgehogs also love it!

If you are interested in our full (almost) gardening activities my November diary entry is now completed on my website here.

Copyright: Original post from Our Plot at Green Lane Allotments http://glallotments.blogspot.co.uk/ author S Garrett