How to Create a Bird-Friendly Environment
(ARA) - Bird watching continues to be a favorite American pastime enjoyed by young and old alike. What better way to relax and spend time together as a family or to teach children about nature than by sitting back and enjoying all the beautiful birds that might visit your yard?
To help maximize your viewing pleasure and ensure a steady flow of colorful songbirds, Lyric, a leading manufacturer of premium wild bird food, offers the following tips:
Most important is feeding consistency. The majority of serious bird watchers feed and continue to care for birds year-round, not just during the cold winter months when food sources are the scarcest. By establishing a regular food source, birds are more likely to get into the habit of visiting your yard for a consistent food supply rather than having to find alternative locations. Keep in mind, too, that even in the warmer months when natural food supplies are more abundant, birds are busy building nests and caring for their young, which means they could benefit from a convenient, nearby food source. The other reason to feed in the spring and summer months is to see birds you would not normally see. Birds migrating through are very grateful for a bite to eat along the way.
The second most important tip for consistently attracting wild birds to your yard is to create an environment that is inviting to them. This includes not just a bird feeder, but also shelter and a safe water source for drinking and bathing.
Keep in mind that birds have many natural predators. To make them feel more secure in your yard and more likely to stay, try to hang feeding stations near trees or bushes where birds can hide, if necessary. Evergreens are particularly appealing to birds because they provide shelter, protection from the weather, and an ideal nesting site. If you’re adding trees or shrubs to your yard, locate them on the west or north ends of the property to help block the wind. Bird baths should also be placed near a tree or other structure that can potentially block colder north winds. And, of course, be sure to keep your cat indoors since more birds are killed each year by cats than from any other cause.
Remember that the key to attracting birds to your yard and motivating them to return again and again is no different than making company feel comfortable in your own home. Make their stay pleasant and enjoyable, and they are more likely to want to visit again.
Key to creating an inviting habitat is providing the right food. Lyric, like a number of other bird food manufacturers, markets a full line of products, including mixes developed to attract specific types of birds, such as chickadees. But for more universal appeal, you should consider a mix that offers a wide variety, such as Lyric Delite, which is scientifically designed to attract the birds you want and keep them coming. Made of premium ingredients, Lyric Delite is totally filler-free and shell-free, which means it’s 100 percent edible. It contains all those good things most desirable to wild birds, including sunflower kernels, peanuts, mixed nuts and pumpkin seeds. These ingredients have proven particularly effective in helping to attract chickadees, woodpeckers, nuthatches and finches, among others.
Experts agree that birds innately know if seed is good or bad. If it’s questionable in quality or condition, they will kick it aside, creating a mess beneath the feeder. But since Lyric Delite features only the highest quality ingredients, you’re less likely to find a large mess beneath your feeder. Plus, there are no shells to fall to the ground. Shells are not only messy by themselves, but given the right weather conditions, they will eventually germinate into weeds and create additional problems. By eliminating shells in your feed mix, you will lessen your maintenance now and down the road. From an economic standpoint, you are also offering more bird dinners per pound than mixes that contain fillers and shells.
Another tip for making birds feel at home in your yard is to provide a clean environment. There are a number of fatal diseases that can originate from unclean food sources. Birds who feed on the ground beneath feeders are especially at risk. The best thing is to clean your feeders and the areas underneath them regularly -- at least once a season, although once a month is ideal. Rubber gloves should always be used when handling and cleaning dirty feeders.
Tube feeders can be soaked in a bucket of hot water and a 10 percent bleach solution, and then brushed clean and dried before refilling. Wooden feeders should be scrubbed with a soap and water mixture, then allowed to dry for at least half a day, or until they are completely free of any residual moisture, which will promptly spoil any new food added to them.
Nectar feeders require even more frequent maintenance -- daily in most cases -- because sugar solutions ferment quickly in hot weather. Scrub these feeders thoroughly with a bottle brush before refilling with a four parts boiled water to one part white, granulated sugar solution or a commercially prepared nectar.
Another tip for keeping food in prime, unspoiled condition is to store it in a sealed container in a dry area. This is especially important for mixes that contain sunflower seeds, because insect eggs are often deposited on the sunflower when it’s growing in the field and can hatch months later.
Water in bird baths should also be changed daily to prevent algae growth and hatching of mosquito larvae. As a further enticement, consider adding a dripper or mister, which will create movement on the water’s surface and attract more interest.
Another addition to consider is a dust bath. The dusting process seems to soak up excess oil and helps keep birds’ feathers in top condition. Make a dust bath with equal parts dry sand and topsoil. Spread this combination in a small, flat area where grass is not growing and rake it from time to time.
Bird feeding and watching can be fun and rewarding. More importantly, you’re doing the birds a favor. Although some people believe that feeding birds will only make them dependent on an artificial food source, studies show that wild birds only get a small percentage of their total food intake from feeders -- usually no more than 25 percent. They tend not to become dependent on any one food source. Specific field studies done with Black-capped Chickadees actually showed that those birds with access to feeders were twice as likely to survive during the months when natural food sources were scarcest.
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