Around 12 months ago, I changed a very popular and busy wire fat/suet ball holder for a rather more aesthetically pleasing wooden one.
Since then, all birds have ignored the new holder completely and this morning I threw away a second set of untouched fat/suet balls - with not one single beak mark anywhere to be seen - because the seeds had started growing!
Now why do the birds totally ignore this unit? They enthusiastically eat the seeds hanging next to it and also, although not very often, the nuts also hanging there.
A blue tit family nest nearby and were frequent diners at the old unit but even they have turned their beaks up!
I have a typical north western urban garden, visited by blue-tits, robins, sparrows etc, but nothing "exotic".
The "new" device is the suet log bird feeder:
http://shop.nationaltrust.org.uk/products/suet-log-bird-feeder/302/
I'm beginning to think that I need to revert to the old method, but before I do that is there anything that I am doing wrong?
Hi Ibozz,
I think the birds may have been used to the wire feeder and been spooked by an unusual new feeder in the place of their regular food source.
Coal
Birding , Birding, Birding !
Thanks, Coal.
It's been there around a year now so they should be used to it. They don't seem scared of it as they sit on the top and feed from a seed holder not a foot away.
I've made some "fat balls" out of lard, nuts, raisins and seeds tonight, shaped in yoghurt pots, and I'm going to put some on the top of the device where they sit to admire the scenery as well as smear some into the holes to see if that will start to make them associate the unit with food.
As suggested above, if they start to eat the food when it is outside, maybe they will follow through and see that there is food inside.
I saw some of this type of feeder in the local branch of a national garden centre chain today, so it isn't just the National Trust who sell them. The garden centre "pet man" had heard no reports of them not being used by birds - but equally no-one had told him they worked, either!
If and when they cancel their boycott, I'll report back and say how i managed it!
Hi iBozz, good luck with that. I have to say though that sometimes there is no explanation for how birds behave. Other folk will tell how their birds love whole peanuts, fat blocks, suet balls etc. yet my regulars won't touch any of them and it does seem the same applies with feeders. I have one of those domed clear perspex feeders (they call it a robin feeder). Starlings think it's great - but the small birds (for whom it is really designed), including the robins, won't give it the time of day!
The necessity of bird-watching is a really good reason for avoiding all forms of housework.
The dust will still be there tomorrow - the birds may not be!
Hi Squirrel,
I've got the same dome feeder that you have and yes the smaller birds took forever to use it and like you only the starling seemed interested. I have a cage seed feeder for the smaller birds and I decided to move the dome one next to it to see if it would make a difference which it did, the smaller birds now seem to use it even the robin! Before that I had it hanging out the open from the apple tree, it is now hanging at the back of the garden on my hawthorne which is slightly more protected so whether this made a difference I'm not really sure. I've been putting mealworms in and have seen the tits and robins go in there - then again it could be the cold that is making them less fussy.
Regards
Kerry
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kezmo6310/
Hi iBozz
iBozz, not long after you opened this thread I saw the exact same fat feeder in our local garden centre and I thought of you when I saw it. I have been in there quite a few times since and have noticed they didn't have any left, they were sold out!