how to attract different species to the garden?

these birds are in my garden all day at the feeders and are pretty hostile so other birds will not visit or atleast not that i have seen. i dont mimd feeding them at all but a wider variety would be nice to see

  • Hello Rochelle and welcome. You have starlings on your feeder and probably all new babies. I call them the school bullies, as once they fledge they take over all the feeders and eat whatever is in them. I have placed two stand feeders a distance apart, that helps a bit as they are not fighting over the one stand with feeders. You could try that. If you have any trees or bushes about that can take a hanging feeder, you could hang one on it's own. The other thing is to feed a variety of food, that would attract different species. Depending where we live we can have different birds coming to the garden. Try putting out sunflower hearts and Niger seed, this will attract the finches, gold, green and chaffinches, as well as siskins. The tits, blue, great, coal, will eat bird seed, but will also eat peanuts. Just now crush them before putting them out, there are still young around and they could choke on whole peanuts. The blackbirds, thrush and Robin like to ground feed so scatter some seed for them.

    Just an add on, always have fresh water available as well, for them to bath and drink from. Good luck.

  • i do have wall feeders too but will try more , the ground feeders wont have any protection once my garden is sorted unfortunately and the area has alot of cats. i avoided peanuts because of the choking hazard bit i guess i can blend them really fine before putting them out? i put out fatballs and filled coconuts, hearts, mealworm, fresh berries, a seed mix and fresh water several times a day due to them crapping in it constantly
  • If you were to get "guardian feeders" (search online, or RSPB shop) you can get some with small enough openings to prevent the starlings getting to all the food. May take a few days for the smaller birds to work out its safe, but we get sparrows, goldfinch and tits, A couple of collared doves and a few pigeons hoover up the spillage

    Edit: My point being that as the starlings can't access the food, they will disperse, leaving the way clear for smaller birds... if that wasn't clear Slight smile

  • Adding to all the other brilliant advice shared, I note the feeding station is a fairly recent addition, and I can understand your landlords concerns over ground feeders, so I'll get the less pleasant bit out the way first.

    My guess the landlords concern will be rats, hence not liking the ground feeder, and that prospect cannot be overlooked with a feeding station. So regular clearing up will go a long way to keep rat visitations down. I can't guarantee no rats, that can and will happen even without feeders.

    Another concern, may also be bird droppings, but realistically, you can't avoid that either.

    Now to the more pleasant bit, I'm under the impression the feeding station is relatively new, so it will take a little while for some birds to find it. While it is nice to see so many starlings, a threatened species, they can be a voracious, and you do seem to have quite a good turnout.

    However, they cannot feed 24/7, and as suggested already, try a variety of feeds to help attract other species and eventually, it will balance out.

    Here we, actually it's my wife's domain, I just pay the bills and capture the images/footage on the trailcams and camera. We use sunflower seed and we get green and gold finches quite regularly, small bird seed and some others.

    But our feeding station has been up four years at least, and we do have a lot of trees, hedges and greenery with woodland around a quarter of a mile away. So for a very urban garden, we are very rich in greenery.

  • landlord isnt bothered about me feeding the birds, he wanted the berry bushes gone and my garden cut down earlier (i usually dont do it until no mow may is over). i wasnt aware starlings were under threat so i will increase the feeders and get some specifically for smaller birds