What Birds Want

Feeding our Feathered Friends

By Amy McDowell

When we moved my husband’s bedridden grandpa into a nursing home, we hung a bird feeder outside his window. Then each time family members visited him, they filled his feeder. His care center was in Polk City, and flocks of goldfinches visited the feeder every day.

He was unable to talk after suffering a stroke, but he would often point out the window at the feeder and smile tenderly. From his bed, he could see the TV and the bird feeder, and although watching TV passed the time, watching the birds obviously gave him great joy.

Grandpa is not the only one who enjoys feeding birds; more than 60 million people in the U.S. spend nearly a billion dollars a year on bird seed, and that figure does not include feeders or accessories like shepherd hooks and squirrel baffles.

What Birds Want

The most popular seed among birds is black oil sunflower seed, according to a 1980 report compiled by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. They watched 13 different kinds of birds choose seeds from specially-designed feeders and found that all of them, including goldfinches, cardinals, chickadees, mourning doves, purple finches, and tufted titmice, chose black oil sunflower seed above all other seeds. The black oil sunflower seeds beat out striped sunflower seeds, red and white millet, sunflower hearts, cracked corn, peanut hearts, safflower seed, and milo.

Suet is popular among insect-eating birds like woodpeckers, robins, and wrens. Store-bought suet cakes are inexpensive and simple to slip into cage-style feeders. Many people make their own suet cakes, and recipes abound online. Most recipes include fresh ground suet, peanut butter, cornmeal, and a mixture of nuts, raisins, and seeds.

The birds will appreciate fresh water. During the winter you can use a heated bird bath or insert a heater into the bowl of your bird bath to keep the water thawed. A cheaper idea is to dump the ice every day and fill the bird bath with warm water. Of course, this won’t work with a heavy concrete birdbath, and it won’t stay thawed for long, but the birds will appreciate your efforts.

The leanest time of year for birds is spring, because their natural food sources from the previous season are gone and plants are not setting seed or producing berries in the current season yet. The months of March through June are more crucial than the winter months.