For weeks or months you've been watching birds flock to your bird feeder. One day, the birds disappear It's especially frustrating when you check the feeder regularly to refill it. The good news is when birds leave your feeder there is usually a simple explanation. Once you know what to look for, these problems are often simple to fix.
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Check PriceFeeder Got Too Dirty
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Birds can be picky for their feeders. A dirty feeder can be a health threat, and birds will avoid them. Mold, bacteria, and droppings build up quickly, especially in warm and humid weather. Sudden changes in weather can cause feed to spoil and become harmful, which birds can tell is a safe environment. Feeders should be cleaned every two weeks during busy hours, bleach and water solutions can be used. Clean feeders will attract more birds, and help prevent a dirty environment. A good scrub to your feeders will help clear out some of the places mold likes to hide. Each type of bird feeder will require a little more love and attention than the others, just don't fill the feeder without letting it completely dry first.
Seed or Nectar Went Bad
Over time, seeds begin to lose their nutritional value. Mold and fungus may even grow inside the seeds. These can be detected by birds even if it looks fine to us. Sunflower seeds, nyjer seeds, and birdseed blends all contain air and moisture, and therefore begin to break down. If you see that birdseed has been sitting in the feeder for over two weeks, or if it has clumped together and has a musty smell, you should toss it out and refill the feeder with fresh seed. Hummingbird nectar spoils even faster than birdseed does. If the weather is hot, nectar will spoil in three to five days. Fermented nectar is dangerous for birds as it causes the nectar to become cloudy and will result in the birds needing to be replaced. To prevent this, store your nectar and seeds in a cool, dry place in an airtight container and try to keep feeders filled with food birds can eat within a week or two. Keeping feeders filled with fresh food will help maintain the feeders popularity with the birds.
Placement in Direct Sun
As feeders placed in full sun face a variety of problems, birds are driven away more and more. Heat and UV rays break down the oils and nutrients of food, and cause the seeds to spoil faster. This causes food to become rotten, which birds will not eat. Nectar that is placed in feeders that are in the sun will ferment in just a day or two, as the sun makes nectar heat up quickly. Instead of keeping nectar fresh for a week, the sun makes it spoil faster. Metal feeders can get way too hot to sit on, and clear plastic feeders can develop algae that turns the nectar cloudy and unappetizing. Also, birds are more likely to visit feeders that are placed near places to hide. Birds have an easier time escaping from danger if the feeders are placed in a way that gives them cover, and feeders placed in the open makes birds feel more vulnerable. Moving your feeder to a more shaded area will provide fresh food, and will encourage more birds to visit.
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Too Few Feeders Out
Birds are often found to be quite hierarchical and will take over feeders and keep quiet or shy birds from getting food. If you only have one feeder, you're likely seeing tons of jays and starlings, while cardinals and chickadees may be present. The best approach to take is simply increasing the number of feeders you have in your yard. If you give aggressive birds more than one feeder to guard by placing the feeders 10-15 feet away from each other, every bird will get a chance to eat. To lessen competition even more and diversify the types of birds visiting your feeders, place a tube feeder for finches, a platform feeder for larger birds and a suet cage for woodpeckers. You don't have to buy a ton of feeders; with only 2 or 3 feeders located in different places in your yard, you can triple the number of birds visiting your yard and get species that have left your yard to return.
Insects Took Over
Ants and wasps, and bees can completely take over feeders, scaring birds from feeding and making them impossible to use. Hummingbird feeders are the most likely to get infested because they use sweet nectar and attract all sorts of pests from ants to hornets. Once bugs like this get established feeding patterns, they will come in swarms and scare away all the birds, even the brave ones. For nectar feeders try using an ant moat, which is a little cup full of water that hangs over the feeder and prevents ants from crossing. Make sure not to have any leaking feeders that will attract pests with drips of nectar, and with seed feeders, check the bottom to make sure seed isn’t spilling and attracting wasps. Some feeders come with a bee guard for the nectar ports and you can also move feeders regularly to break up the insect patterns. Birds can come back surprisingly quickly after removing feeders.
Natural Food Abundant
Attracting and feeding birds is fun, and it's even more fun knowing that you're helping out the local ecosystem, but there are some times of the year when feeding birds is not as helpful. In August and September, birds have plenty of more natural sources of food available, and food from your bird feeder may even become unimportant or unnecessary. It’s completely normal for them to choose natural food supplies over food sources provided by people. Over the late summer and early fall season, more insects are available and more seeds are given by different plants. With all these food sources available, and with all these food sources available, birds really do not need to depend on feeder food. More insects are also available to pick at and therefore during the time period of hanging food supplies, those birds may choose to leave the hanging food supplies alone. While consistent feeding birds may be more prominent in winter seasons than summer seasons and hanging food supplies should decrease in food supplies, birds will still be able to easily note a hanging food supply as a winter food supply resource and will flock to it often. So, while birds will go to fedding stations in winter, they will may even increase feeding stations when natural food supplies decrease to be able to access the food supply.
Birds Feared Predators
Birds will avoid feeders where they think there are predators such as cats or hawks. This is because they have great memories for places they have previously found unsafe and will avoid dangerous places for multiple days, weeks, or even longer. The most frequent predators at bird feeders are outdoor cats, but birds are also wary of some types of hawks, such as sharp-shinned and Cooper’s hawks, as they tend to hunt birds in that area. If you have seen predators near your feeders or if feathers from birds have been found, you now know why birds are not coming to your feeders. The closer you put your feeders to bushes (ten to fifteen feet) that birds can duck into for safety from predators (and so that cats can’t jump and hide), the more comfortable birds will feel taking food from your feeders. Once the perceived threat has diminished enough, birds will feel comfortable feeding at your feeders again. You may even want to put a wire cage around some of your feeders to keep the ground-fed birds safe from the predators.
Seasonal Migration Shifted
Seasonal rhythms cause many birds to change locations. The spring and fall seasons are especially active times for birds like orioles and warblers, who migrate great distances. Even though chickadees and cardinals are year-round residents, they also shift their locations and routines with the seasons. If your feeder stopped receiving traffic in the late summer and early fall, this is likely due to several birds moving south for the winter. Come spring, some of your feeder birds will depart for northern locations where they will breed. It is healthy and normal for birds to exhibit this behavior. Part of the enjoyment of bird feeding is the knowledge that you will see different birds visiting your winter feeders than the summer feeders. It is a guarantee that as the seasons change you will have new birds visiting your feeders, given that you maintain your feeders.
