Hand Feeding Wild Birds

Hand feeding your birds is quick, fun, and not all that complicated. The more you do it, the more comfortable your birds are with the whole idea.

The real secret is to sit very still. At first you have to hold your hand out in front of you, so it is wise to prop your arm on something.

In the Marine Corps they used to make us hold our rifle out in front of us until our arms fatigued. When you would begin to drop your arms, a bull- dog-looking drill instructor in a Smokey Bear hat would scream at you and that would give your arms new strength. So if you can’t find something to rest your arm on, have someone scream at you every 10 minutes.



There are books out on hand feeding birds. There may be some better techniques but it really isn’t graduate material. It has much more to do with supply and demand.

I taught my dog to fall dead when I shoot her with my finger, get her dish, shake hands and catch a biscuit off the end of her nose. I am not so demanding with my birds but I am almost sure they are capable of it. My dog sounds smart but if you put her on a leash you have dope-on-a-rope. Anyone can hand feed birds—even you. Try it!

Nagging Questions About Birds and Squirrels

The "Look"
When it comes to competition for food at the feeder, the alpha squirrel is easy to spot by the "look." This furball never has to make a sound; all he has to do is supply the "look." The "look" can be felt. The dominant squirrel controls food flow. If another animal approaches the feeder, the dominant squirrel will shoot a "look" that would make a wood duck—duck. This will usually end the challenge. If not, a bluff charge is in order. If you study your squirrels, you will discover a whole arsenal of "looks."
There is the "straight-on look," the "side-shot look," the "short look," the "long look," the "glance dance," and the "glare stare."
Each "look" was developed for a particular situation, and some are used in combination with the "bluff charge." At the same time, optic nerves have to network with hearing capabilities. When a squirrel is concentrating on the "look," he still has to hear the side door of the house quietly open. He has to hear the bristles of the broom flutter in the still morning air. Some say a squirrel has the ability to hear the rapid heartbeat of a homeowner through double-pane glass. This is a myth. A squirrel has exceptional hearing, but it is not that good. What the squirrel detects through the window is—the "look."

Do Birds Belch?
How many times have you sat at the window, watching your birds at the feeder, and wondered about this? Have you ever heard a bird burp? You would think birds would burp by the way they gulp down food.
The definition of a bird belch is "to eject [gas] noisily from the stomach through the beak." In France, if a bird belches at the birdfeeder it means it truly enjoyed the meal.

Greased Lightning
A question many people have been asking themselves is: "Are my chances of being hit by lightning lesser or greater than being hit by bird droppings?"
There are many things to consider when trying to answer this question. First, there are many more birds than lightning bolts. When you hear thunder, you know you were not hit by lightning. If you hear a bird, however, it does not necessarily mean you weren’t hit by a dropping. Your chances of getting hit by lightning used to be one in a million. But since the world population has increased, lightning has more targets, which makes your chances of getting hit by a bolt one in five million.
The same thing is true with birds. More people, more targets, less chance of being dropped on. Also, the world’s bird populations are dropping dramatically, which makes getting hit with bird droppings even more rare.
But if you assume you will be hit by lightning, before you will be hit by a bird dropping, you are wrong. A weather system will only produce a small number of storms, and a storm will only produce a small number of lightning bolts, but birds will produce droppings continuously because birds have no bladders. Your actual chances of getting hit by a bird dropping is 150 percent.

During cold months, birds burn more than half of their daily calories trying to stay warm. To compensate for that loss, birds look for high-calorie food rich in oils, proteins and fats—and you can help them find it.
The easiest way to help them is to provide some form of suet, a hard beef or mutton fat that has been melted and solidified again. You'll find suet in ready-to-use cakes, often supplemented with corn, nuts, oaks, millet, fruit, mealworms and other healthy ingredients. These cakes, and the wire baskets for holding them, can be found at wildlife, hardware and garden stores.
To create your own suet, ask the meat cutter at your local grocery store for any leftover trimmings. A mesh onion bag makes a great homemade suet feeder. I'm just giving you a little false hope here. Your butcher is not going to give you anything. He found out that bird feeding has become a billion dollar business and what used to be free trimmings now costs as much as a good pot roast. But the birds still appreciate it just as much.
If you are crafty or enjoy smelling the kitchen up you can dip pieces of stale white bread in plain melted suet, then roll the pieces in birdseed. Attach twine to the bread and hang it from a tree.
Another option is to melt suet in your microwave and pour it into an ice-cube tray. Add bits of fruit or seeds, then place the tray in your freezer to harden. The hardened cubes can be scattered on the ground or placed in your platform feeder.

Here's a recipe for oat-ball bird feeders:

Materials:
3½ cups oatmeal
1 pound melted suet
1 small jar peanut butter
3½ cups cornmeal
3½ cups cream of wheat

Directions: Cook the oatmeal and combine it with melted suet and peanut butter. Mix well. Stir in the cornmeal and cream of wheat. After the mixture cools, shape it into balls. Hang the balls in an onion bag for the birds to enjoy.

Build Your Bird a Roost

—The best way for most people to start a study of birds is to establish a bird feeder, roosting box or nesting box. The best time to feed birds or offer a roosting box is in the winter, when there are fewer species present and when many birds can be attracted to the bird feeder for observation or the roosting box for shelter.

Watching the feeding birds can help people recognize the different species. During the winter months the lack of variety should help in figuring who's who. By spring you should have your winter birds figured out, so that you can concentrate on who the spring migrants are, using the process of elimination.

Several species have changed their winter range, thanks to bird feeding. Among these are Evening Grosbeaks, which come in flocks for sunflower seeds. Cardinals have started nesting far north of their historical range, probably because of the winter food provided at feeders. Some birds that usually eat dormant insects and their eggs in the winter can be attracted to feeders by fat-rich foods such as suet, and, for some species, sunflower seeds. Nuthatches, woodpeckers, and chickadees are all fat-loving species.

Most people know that putting out a nest box will attract nesting birds in summer. But did you know that small birds often use these same boxes for shelter at night, particularly in winter? Sometimes more than a dozen birds will pile into a single box to conserve heat. But nest boxes are far from ideal for overnight roosting. They are usually too small for a group. Plus most birds need to perch or cling while roosting, but nest boxes have no perching surfaces inside.You can help your backyard birds keep warm overnight with a specially designed roost box.

Any backyard favorites that typically nest in boxes—bluebirds, chickadees, titmice, nuthatches, and small woodpeckers—may seek refuge in it.Roosting boxes differ from nest boxes in several important ways. A good roost box is designed to prevent the birds' body heat from escaping, so, unlike a nest box, it lacks ventilation holes. Also, its entrance hole is near the bottom of the box so the rising warmth doesn't escape. Inside a roost box there are several perches made from small wooden dowels, staggered at different levels. In addition, the inside front and rear walls are roughened, scored, or covered with hardware cloth so that woodpeckers can cling to them. A hinged top allows easy access so you can clean the box.An entrance hole about 2 inches in diameter will admit most small birds.

Feeding Hummingbirds

Feeding hummingbirds is as easy as making orange juice in the morning. If you mix your own nectar, use four parts water to one part sugar—refrigerate what you don’t use. Do not substitute honey for sugar. Honey can cause a fungus that has been known to affect the tiny bird’s tongue. You do not want to kill your birds with kindness. Do not use additives with your homemade nectar. Adding color and sweeteners will not help attract more birds and, in some cases, can be harmful.
Do not put a lot of nectar out until you notice they’re using it all. Sugar solutions are very susceptible to mold, harmful bacteria, and fermentation. Like suet, be careful to put out small amounts in shaded areas during hot weather.
Clean your hummingbird feeders regularly before each refill, using hot soapy water and a household bleach solution (one capful per gallon) or white vinegar, but rinse extremely well. If your feeder has hard-to-reach, grime-gathering grungy spots, add to the solution a dozen BBs or a handful of sand and shake, rattle, and roll. Another method used to clean feeder parts is soaking them in warm water and tossing in some denture cleaner. I guarantee it will put a smile on your hummingbird’s face.
If you clean your feeder with vinegar, feel free to swig a swill yourself. It can help your arthritis, aid digestion, lower cholesterol, grow hair on your bald spots, and soothe sprained muscles from squirrel chasing.
If you are looking for a jump-start on feeding hummers, because they haven’t shown up at your nectar feeder yet, try placing a flower box nearby. You don’t have to go out and buy a miniature Busch Gardens; a simple flower box will get the job done. Annuals are a good choice. They are often prolific and bloom longer. You don’t have to buy all red flowers; hummers like variety. Try putting some perching areas on your flower boxes. Studies show that hummers perch 60 percent of the time; they are just not noticed often in that position.
Hummingbirds weigh so little you could actually mail ten of them using a regular postage stamp. You will be surprised at how much these little egg beaters can consume. It takes a lot of energy to beat those wings as fast as they do. Their wings will go up and down 78 to 200 times per second, depending on what gear they are in. When they are in love they are in high gear.
If you watch closely, you will notice hummers do not suck the nectar from your feeder; they actually lick it out. When a hummer is thirsty, he can often get in 12 licks per second.
Now think about this: Hummers can beat their wings an average of 140 times per second, lick 12 times per second, breathe 4 times per second, and never look at the flowers they are eating from. At the same time they watch the one they plan to visit next and make sure no one else tries to beat them to it. These have to be very coordinated birds. They can fly forward, backward, up side down, and sideways. They can hover while picking and choosing which no-see-um to eat next, and then do aerial maneuvers that make the Blue Angels look like bush pilots. If you’re not feeding hummers, you’re missing the greatest show on Earth!

Woodchucks and Woodpeckers

Your woodpeckers love a little suet, seed and siding to round out their day. Often when you offer them the suet and seed they end up irritating you by bill drilling the siding. There are reasons for this behavior and it has nothing to do with malice. Birds do not go out of their way to irritate homeowners.
There are several reasons woodpeckers peck on wood, the same goes for woodchucks I guess. With woodpeckers, it’s food, shelter and a need for a little lovin’—I mean more than they are getting from you already.
Spring "drumming" is a courtship ritual that most woodpeckers use to drum up business, it’s a territory claim and a way to impress females of their real estate holdings. Your house might just be a big part of a woodpeckers portfolio. If he really likes your house he might do more than drum, he might move in, which means excavation—large opening, throwing insulation out.
The most often asked woodpecker question I get when doing speaking engagements is, "why are woodpeckers making the siding of my house look like Bonnie and Clyde’s car after they were cornered by the cops?"
Actually, your woodpeckers are telling you something—your house is bugged. They are feeding on bugs that are living in your siding. To get to them, they pound, chisel and carve their way to their cravings.
First, do a little detective work. If you discover holes, were they created by woodpeckers? A carpenter bee makes a lot of big holes in siding that look like woodpecker holes. Either way, fill the holes with a little linseed oil and repair with wood putty. This will repair the siding and often destroy the insects, therefore making your siding unattractive to woodpeckers. Getting rid of the insects is key.
Scare tactics like mylar balloons and reflective tape might scare a few birds off, but the majority of woodpeckers like bugs more than they dislike mylar. I have targeted a directional water sprinkler at a woodpecker siding site and it harassed them enough that they stopped visiting that side of my house—Once again proving that non-violence can bring a peaceful ending to conflict in a conflicted world.
—Keep Smilin’, Dick E. Bird

Bird Sex ID

We have all struggled to ID the sex of various birds. Sometimes it is easy as either the male or female is brightly colored, smaller, or has some other very distinguishing characteristic. But when the phenotype of both male and female are identical, the process of determining sex gets much more difficult.
I have found that a bird’s sex can sometimes be distinguished by their behavior. With a little practice, almost any biologist can become proficient in this manner. Look at the picture below and see if you can identify the male and female bird in the picture.