Feeding the Birds

We haven’t fed the birds here for a while. But, seeing as the garden was becoming more wildlife friendly with the introduction of a pond, I thought it would be nice to do so. The addition of a pond actually meant moving the water feature and reinstating the pump. The birds have loved this during this warm, dry weather. They seem to queue up to have a bath in it and drink the water. It was probably this that prompted me to buy some bird feeders more than anything else.

So, whilst at the doctor’s surgery the other day I popped into the shops and bought a couple of bird feeders, some bird seed and a tub of fat balls. I also bought some dried mealworms as the pied wagtail that is nesting in our log store should enjoy those!

I put them out for the first time yesterday, expecting it to take a while for the birds to feel confident enough to use them. Having not fed the bird here for a few years they might take a while to find them and feed from them. That wasn’t quite the case as within a few minutes there were birds on them and within a few hours all of the seeds and the 4 fat balls had disappeared!

I can’t afford to keep feeding them if they are going to get through it at that rate!!!

The variety of birds that I saw wasn’t huge as the starlings seemed to take the majority of the food, but there were also sparrows, chaffinches, the pied wagtail, the occasional blackbird and a couple of magpies that would chase everything else off now and then.

These aren’t the greatest of photos as they were taken into the sun, through the conservatory window and on my iPhone, but once the food has all gone the starlings hang around either perched on top of the pergola or on the ground waiting for me to refill the feeders!!

The addition of the feeders seems to have made the water feature even more attractive. At one point yesterday there must have been 10 birds all crammed onto the small area at the top of it!

It looks as though I’m going to have to get a decent supply of bird food and will just feed them once a day. Once the food has gone for that day it’s gone! I will probably buy a peanut feeder and a sack of peanuts too as it’ll take them a little longer to get through the peanuts than it will the seeds.

Tags: Birds