It’s already been a tough year for the wild birds. In fact, according to surveys, they’ve just had their worst breeding season ever – or at least since records began. The dismal spring and summer weather meant that the insect food that so many species rely on for feeding their young wasn’t around when they needed it. Add to that the cool, wet conditions which were chilling the young while they were still in the nest and, in some cases, flooding or washing the nests away, and you have a really difficult season for our birds. The only species to have a reasonable breeding season was the blackbird – largely because they feed their young on worms and beetles which don’t mind the damp.
After such a disastrous breeding season, it seems only right to be putting some extra food out to help the garden birds through the winter months. Then, when next spring arrives (and next year will be better – surely), they should be in tip top condition and ready to nest. The natural food in the garden is running down. The sunflower seeds were long ago stripped from the heads left on this summer’s plants, and the blackbirds who hang out at the bottom of our garden have just about finished off the windfall apples. Of course, there is still the compost heap. The birds are spending long hours foraging on the heap, and making a big mess as they throw things around while they search for food.
Like thousands of other people, we supplement the natural food in the garden with bird seed, peanuts and fat balls. The bird feeders hang on an elder growing in the hedge near the garage. The elder makes a good feeding station – the birds can hop down from the hedge and we can watch them from the kitchen window, everyone is happy! There used to be a bird table as well, but the local pheasant was forever trying to land on the table and knocked it over so many times that we gave up. The pheasant still hangs around – picking up bits of food that fall from the feeders. And the feeders attract pretty much the entire UK sparrow population – well maybe that’s a slight exaggeration, but it does sometimes feel like they’re all here in our garden. A noisy, cheeping mixture of house and tree sparrows descend every morning to eat a huge amount of bird seed and devour fat balls by the dozen. They’re lovely to watch, but I think the sheer numbers of them – thirty or more at a time, puts the other birds off visiting our feeders. We get the odd robin and an occasional brave blue tit, but mostly it’s a gang of sparrows.
Which birds are visiting your garden?
The Garden Deli 
Wonderful Sarah! I always feed the birds and with similar ingredients to you…..I am in France now until just before Christmas, can I send the book to you when I am back in the UK? I will have to actually, as I left it in Yorkshire! I have NOT forgotten and I have it all safe and sound for you! Karen
Don’t worry about the book Karen – if you’re busy with other stuff in the run up to Christmas we can always use it as an excuse to meet for a coffee in the new year…
Good plan, anything for a chance to meet for coffee and cake to maybe? Karen
We feed the birds in winter, too, after the ground freezes and the wild berries are gone. Some of my chickadees are hanging around the porch already, waiting for a handout!
They learn very quickly where the food comes from! We used to have a blackbird who would sit looking in at the back door until someone took some food out to him.
I miss feeding the birds but living here in the Hebirdes and with our house being so close to the shore, seeds attract rats. Also feeding in such open ground would bring passerines (mostly meadow pipit and twite) a little too much attention from the local hen harrier population! The blackbirds do enjoy digging around in the compost heap though.
We are lucky(?) in that the rats are distracted by the hen’s food at the bottom end of the garden and, so far at least, don’t come near the house!
We have so many cats in the neighbourhood we daredn’t try and feed the birds, but we still have so many feeding on various berries and in the trees. We’ve had a lot of nuthatches this autumn, as well as blue tits, coal tits, great tits, blackbirds and redstarts. Thankfully the crows have moved on – they serenaded me every morning at breakfast all through November!
Cats can be a nuisance (and I say that as a cat owner) – it’s one of the reasons I stick with hanging feeders, the cats can look but catching anything is just too much effort!
Its breeding season here and there are definitely quite a few babies about as I keep seeing the usually nectar loving wattlebirds and honey eaters getting insects for their babies.
Nectar-feeding birds always sound so exotic and interesting!
Goldfinches, greenfinches, and the tit family are our most frequent visitors they get through an enormous amount of food every day. The blackbirds feed on wizened apples that I keep for them, this morning a crow came down and flew off with half an apple and a flock of magpies devoured a crushed fat ball that I left on the path for thrushes.
We’ve had a lot of goldfinches in the garden over the last couple of years, but reading your comment has made me realise that I haven’t seen any for a while now. I hope they come back, they’re lovely little birds.
Lovely photos – and thanks for the reminder to put out a bit more bird food! The hedges were hanging in berries only a few weeks ago, now I can hardly see any rosehips or hawthorn berries, and no sloes – so the birds have polished off the easy pickings.We have a few fatballs hanging up, but now that the hard frosts have arrived, a bit more would be good. We do have problems with rats – but like you, the main attraction is the chicken feed, so the problem isn’t too bad in the garden! We get a few sparrows visiting, but mainly bluetits, blackbirds, the odd robin or thrush and – my personal favourite – a giant green woodpecker who flies as if he can barely keep himself in the air…