Our birds have suddenly stopped coming..

Hi! I’m not remotely knowledgeable, but it could be something as simple as some good food somewhere else? I had about 20 sparrows here for suet cakes, but now even though I leave great birdseed for them, they’ve disappeared from my feeder and are next door aways in the grass & in someone else’s back yard. I can’t afford the suet cakes at the moment but it looks like they’re doing more than fine on their own. It’s been a good summer here so far without the extreme horrid heatwaves, so maybe it’s a bumper year for them?
I don’t know anything about noise deterrents, but maybe Now’s a good time to try and get smaller birds to your garden. I’d assume if you can hear them, they’ll likely have an eye on what’s going on food-wise with you. I found a video on using a dog crate as a bird feeder. They put theirs on tall posts, but I’ve just put mine on an old bar table outside and it works a treat. I hang a suet cake feeder from the top and there’s plenty of space for ground feeding as well (I’ve just bought a raised ground feeder to go in there). You just need to drill a few holes in the plastic base. Just Google “dog crate bird feeder” and you’ll see what I mean. I don’t have as much of an issue with big birds - a few pigeons and a crow family I feed separately. The crows seem to adore soaked dry mealworms & no one else is eating them, so they don’t seem interested in the other feeders I have. May be worth trying the crate as when the big ones come back they won’t bully others out?