Garden Birds chat 2011

whyulittle

Back garden is alive with chattering sparrows.

Mickeroo

Whats the best thing to do with fat balls? Anytime I've gotten them the bigger birds just pull them loose and fly off with them!

Alun

The goldfinches are back at my nijer feeder with a vengeance at last. Other birds are being seen too, but are being a bit cautious, possibly because I've recently added anti-squirrel cages to my two main feeders (not to deter squirrels, I don't have any here, but to prevent two rather fat wood-pigeons from breaking the trays on the feeders )

cscook

Mickeroo wrote: »

Whats the best thing to do with fat balls? Anytime I've gotten them the bigger birds just pull them loose and fly off with them!

I don't use the containers that they sell for them, I actually use one of the small peanut feeders. I take the netting off the fat balls and put two or three into that. The birds get all but a very few sunflower seeds out, and except for when a magpie knocks it down, the smaller birds do very well. You just have to be sure to clean it out / disinfect regularly to stop gunk and some seeds building up at the bottom. I never found hanging them straight from the branches to be much good, easy pickings for the magpies, although I never saw any fly off with them.

Mickeroo

cscook wrote: »

I don't use the containers that they sell for them, I actually use one of the small peanut feeders. I take the netting off the fat balls and put two or three into that. The birds get all but a very few sunflower seeds out, and except for when a magpie knocks it down, the smaller birds do very well. You just have to be sure to clean it out / disinfect regularly to stop gunk and some seeds building up at the bottom. I never found hanging them straight from the branches to be much good, easy pickings for the magpies, although I never saw any fly off with them.

Cheers, will give that a try

doctor evil

I've had Nyger seed out for over a week now and no Goldfinches, anybody knows why that is?

Rainbowsend

Mickeroo wrote: »

Whats the best thing to do with fat balls? Anytime I've gotten them the bigger birds just pull them loose and fly off with them!

I was sooo tempted to say "go on a diet" but I will be grown up and tell you what I do with them, always take the net bags off them as the little birds can get their feet entangled in them, had a finch once that was just hanging there by his little foot, so now I always take them off, then pop them into a feeder, you can get them made for them but the holes are very big and the crows just have them gone in seconds, so as cscook says use the peanut holders.

Half-cocked

E39MSport wrote: »

This is my emergency solution holding 5 litres of feed. They've cleaned out half of it since lunch time yesterday so I'd need 3 of them to cover my away time.
Coal tits are divils for chucking everything out to get at the sunflower seeds but it suits the dunnocks etc.
I've noticed that the Chaffinches and sparrows are happy on the ground too.

Next solution is the wavin. Hope to get to it next weekend. Will fit a catch tray to help keep vermin at bay. Hopefully the ground dwellers will use it.

I bought some automatic pheasant feeders a while back, about €50 each inc P&P.

http://www.cabelas.com/product/American-Hunter-R-Pro-Feeder-Kit/742247.uts?Ntk=AllProducts&searchPath=%2Fcatalog%2Fsearch%2F%3FN%3D1000002653%26Ne%3D1000002653%26Ntk%3DAllProducts%26Ntt%3Dfeeder%26Ntx%3Dmode%252Bmatchallpartial%26WTz_l%3DHeader%253BSearch-All%2BProducts%26WTz_st%3DSearchRefinements%26form_state%3DsearchForm%26search%3Dfeeder%26searchTypeByFilter%3DAllProducts&Ntt=feeder&WTz_l=Header%3BSearch-All+Products

You screw them under a feed drum with a 2 inch hole drilled in the bottom. You can set them to go off 2 to 4 times daily with an adjustable amount of feed. The batteries are about €8 but last forever. I'm thinking of getting one for the garden when I'm away on hols. A little modification with a large tube over the sprayer would drop the feed onto a tray rather than spraying it alover the ground. Given the cost of bird feed these days, I think it would pay for itself quick enough by cutting down wastage.

The pheasants and ducks quickly learn what time the feeders go off, I'm sure garden birds would too.

Half-cocked

doctor evil wrote: »

I've had Nyger seed out for over a week now and no Goldfinches, anybody knows why that is?

They come and go. I get up to 12 one week, and then none for a week or two. Then they all arrive back again! There's a lot of wild seed out there at the moment so they don't need to rely on us for food. Leave the nyjer out and they'll come eventually.

Mickeroo

Rainbowsend wrote: »

I was sooo tempted to say "go on a diet" but I will be grown up and tell you what I do with them...

If a bird had flown off with my fat balls in that respect a diet would be the least of my worries :eek::D

Thanks for the advice, will do!

Mickeroo

Feeders are going well. Mostly Chaffinch, Blue, Great and Coal Tits and a few Greenfinch and Goldfinch. Saw a bird today that I don't usually see, I'm confinced it was a tree sparrow but apparently they're not found much in the west? going by the pictures on Birdwatch Ireland it looked more like a tree than the more common house sparrow. Is there anyother kind of bird it could have been?

whyulittle

Dunnock?

Mickeroo

whyulittle wrote: »

Dunnock?

Pretty sure it wasn't a Dunnock, it had a white and black head. Its back and wings were brown and it seemed to have a stripes running straight down its back.

Pie Man

reed bunting

http://www.google.ie/search?tbm=isch&hl=en&source=hp&biw=1274&bih=617&q=reed+bunting&gbv=2&oq=reed+bunting&aq=f&aqi=g1g-m2g-S4&aql=1&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=896l10095l0l11156l14l14l0l0l0l0l528l4268l2-1.6.3.1l11l0

Mickeroo

Pie Man wrote: »

reed bunting

http://www.google.ie/search?tbm=isch&hl=en&source=hp&biw=1274&bih=617&q=reed+bunting&gbv=2&oq=reed+bunting&aq=f&aqi=g1g-m2g-S4&aql=1&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=896l10095l0l11156l14l14l0l0l0l0l528l4268l2-1.6.3.1l11l0

That looks it alright.

Bsal

This evening around 5:15pm my local Blackbird starting singing in the tree at the end of my garden. It was his actual song not his alarm call, I couldn't believe it.

Half-cocked

Did anyone buy any of those transparent plastic globe feeders from Aldi the other week? I have two, and so far the only birds to figure them out are coal, blue and great tits, plus a female chaffinch. They seem a good way of feeding these small birds without the bigger species muscling in all the time (I have plenty of other feeders for them).

Kess73

Half-cocked wrote: »

Did anyone buy any of those transparent plastic globe feeders from Aldi the other week? I have two, and so far the only birds to figure them out are coal, blue and great tits, plus a female chaffinch. They seem a good way of feeding these small birds without the bigger species muscling in all the time (I have plenty of other feeders for them).

I looked at them, but thought that they might hold mositure and ruin the seeds.

I use the anti moisture granules in my regular feeders alright but avoided the globes. Are they actually alright with regards to rain/moisture retention?

Half-cocked

So far so good with the moisture. They have some small drainage holes in the bottom. I did figure they'd need cleaning out quite frequently though.

BrianD3

I've just started feeding again - stopped due to trichomoniasis and also my local petstore was not stocking black sunflower seeds for a while.

At least 5 coal tits visiting the feeder which I'm delighted with as they are probably my favourite bird. They are going through a large amount of black sunflower seed though - not eating it, taking it all around the garden and hiding it as coal tits tend to do.

Looking at them today there was a seed leaving the feeder about every 5 secs for most of the day!

92cooper

We live bang in the city centre, in the Guinness brewery essentially (above the keg yard) and we've been feeding a large family of great tits and a couple of their friends. Haven't seen them in a couple of months now, but they were buzzing the feeder earlier (which I had to relocate due to some very dumb pigeons) well they arrived back with their sparrow and robin friend... Great stuff

cjmcork

never been in this section of boards before, but I have 2 birds in some brush in my back garden and I've looked for it online, it's small but has a peachy / orangey chest - the only thing I can find similar to it is a Stonechat? Anyone know if they're around the Macroom area in Cork - never even heard of them until I saw it last week

Mickeroo

cjmcork wrote: »

never been in this section of boards before, but I have 2 birds in some brush in my back garden and I've looked for it online, it's small but has a peachy / orangey chest - the only thing I can find similar to it is a Stonechat? Anyone know if they're around the Macroom area in Cork - never even heard of them until I saw it last week

Chaffinch?

Bsal

I just checked BWI website to see when the winter garden bird survey starts and it says 28th November. Last year was my first time doing it and I really enjoyed it, can't wait for this one. Register for free to take part http://www.birdwatchireland.ie/?tabid=91

cjmcork

Mickeroo wrote: »

Chaffinch?

could be - but the colour seemed more vivid than that.......haven't a clue to be honest, but it really stood out from the green of the brush

iora_rua

Could be a bullfinch? Similar markings, but stronger colouring. Also, has a rather plaintive call. We have lots of them - we can hear them, but they're quite timid.

cjmcork

iora_rua wrote: »

Could be a bullfinch? Similar markings, but stronger colouring. Also, has a rather plaintive call. We have lots of them - we can hear them, but they're quite timid.

that looks far more like what I saw - that colour on the breast pops out, it's fab, didn't hear their call, but I'd be 99% certain that's what it was - thanks!

ThunderCat

BrianD3 wrote: »

At least 5 coal tits visiting the feeder which I'm delighted with as they are probably my favourite bird.

Have to agree, I love the coal tit. Only seem to have one out the back garden but one is enough. Beautiful little things. The agility of them is amazing, as is the same for the blue tit etc.

Quick question for any of yous - do you ever get Pied Wagtails visiting your feeders? I always see a few of them out on the road and path at the front of the house but they never seem to visit my back garden which is well stocked. I take it they prefer to forage out on open ground than visit the feeders?

E39MSport

Insect eaters I think. Having said that, I get Robins on my feeders.

ThunderCat

E39MSport wrote: »

Insect eaters I think. Having said that, I get Robins on my feeders.

The Robin that visits my garden goes straight for the crumpled up digestive biscuits I leave on the wall.:)