Where do all the garden birds go july-sep

Cork boy 55

I live in the city, but we are blessed with a huge back garden
We put out plenty of food and water
My garden during the spring was like a zoo ,100's of birds, dozen different species.

Alll the small common garden birds
starlings, Blackbirds, robins, finches, sparrows, blue tits etc etc.
Tons of chicks this year more than I have every seen

Then around july every year all the small birds disappear
nothing about but pigeons and crows.

From previous experience i know many of them return around sep

So where do they all go from july-sep???????

Amateur bird watcher.

Mongarra

Like you I just watch and feed them and don't know much about their habits, but I live in a rural area and I think a lot of them have alternative food when the crops are being harvested. They go to the main supplier in the fields rather than come to the garden where the food has been packed and, sometimes, processed, so would not be as fresh or as tasty as the genuine article.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

That's it. In Summer they need live food to feed their young. There is usually plenty of "natural" food available for them without visiting bird tables. They also moult after breeding and hide out in thick shelter at that period. All this said, please continue to provide food all year round, so it is available should they need it. I still get regular visitors during Summer but just not in great numbers.

swifts need our help!

From July for 6 weeks birds are moulting and have to hide away until they can fly 100%. And like mentioned above there is lots of fruit in the hedges and seeding grasses

Mark

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

The timing of moults varies from species to species. Some birds do a pratial pre-breeding moult and a full moult in Autumn. Others moult before migrating away from us, other wait until they arrive in their Wintering areas. Those that do moult post-breeding usually begin in early August. many don't have a full moult at all but gradually replace feathers over several months.
Also, the duration of a moult varies. Larger species take longer to moult than smaller ones, e.g. a Blue Tit, will moult all feathers over approx 6 weeks, a Herring Gull will be about 6 months, but a Buzzard may take several years for a complete change of flight feathers. Keratin needed to make feathers is less abundant in vegetative matter than in insects, so seed-eating birds, like Chaffinches, usually take a couple of weeks longer to moult than insect-eating birds, like Robins and Dunnocks.

Cork boy 55

Kye Fat Barbershop wrote: »

That's it. In Summer they need live food to feed their young.

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They raisied their young in the garden it was after they finished that that they disappered.

I wonder is there an advantage to birds raising young in the semi-woodland that is modern middle class suburbia and also an advantage to wintering there given the amount of food and water people leave out