I recently read an article about how to attract more chickadees to your yard. I realized that over the last two years I had done a lot of the things suggested and it really has paid off. It has also worked to increase the population of other bird species on our property.
Two years ago we moved onto our property in November. I spent time outdoors that winter doing a fair amount of snow shoveling and then, after Christmas, using snowshoes to walk about. I recall seeing very few birds that winter. Only a couple chickadees and one or two woodpeckers.
Last winter I decided to put out a bird feeder and keep it regularly stocked. The bird population grew to include a pair of blue jays, some white breasted nuthatches, a pair of hairy woodpeckers, a pair of downy woodpeckers and probably three pairs of chickadees. Most of them came to the feeder to enjoy the birdseed and the suet cakes I put out for them.
I upped my bird feeding game this summer by adding a feeding station near the wildflower garden. This pole has four branches that come out and came with two silo type feeders as well as another suet cage. I bought a large bag of black oil sunflower seeds in addition to the big bag of mixed seed from Costco. The birds prefer the sunflower seeds but will eat the mixed when they get desperate.
After our first snowfall last Sunday, which appears like it may be staying, the birds starting eating more ravenously. I filled both feeders and within a few days they were empty again. There are now more chickadees than I can count, multiple pairs of blue jays, magpies, nuthatches and both woodpecker species coming to the feeders.
I put out suet in two cages and filled both feeders again on Wednesday. Only the mixed birdseed is left. The weather is warmer, hovering around 0° during the day now, so they don’t need me to fill everything just yet.
There are still a few other birds that I see in our forest. They are either too shy to come to the feeder or that is not what they like to eat. I decided to try to make some smaller birdseed cookies to hang farther away from the house to see if I can entice them. At the worst, the regular bird feeder visitors will find them and eat them.
Hanging Birdseed Cookies
Ingredients
2 cups mixed birdseed
1 pkg of gelatin
2 tbsp cold water
1/3 cup boiling water
Directions
To the pkg of gelatin add the 2 Tbsp of cold water. After about a minute, pour in the 1/3 boiling water and stir until all the gelatin is dissolved. Add the gelatin mixture to the birdseed and stir to combine.
Place about 8 cookie cutters on a parchment paper lined baking sheet. Spray each well with cooking spray. Using a teaspoon, fill each cookie cutter with birdseed gently pressing down with the back of the spoon. Using a skewer or thin straw, create a hole in each for a string to pass through.
Place the tray in the refrigerator for a few hours to harden. Bring tray to room temperature again before removing the cookies from the cutters by gently pressing them out. Attach a piece of ribbon, string or twine to each.
Before living on an acreage, I had this idea that birds were more interactive during the summer months. You definitely see more bird species in the summer but I find that the birds are more friendly in winter. They aren’t focused on breeding or feeding their young. In winter, their primary focus is getting enough food to stay warm using the least amount of energy as possible. I like that I can help with that by putting out different types of bird feed that they like and especially the part where I get to feed them from my hand.
I went out today to hang these cookies in spots where birds often are. I figured out a few things.
Skinnier shapes don’t hold together well. When I tried to hang the squirrel shape, the head fell off and Shay ate it. There is a bit of irony in that happening.
Mixed birdseed with sunflower seeds doesn’t hold together quite enough with just one pkg of gelatin. Next time I might try 1.5 packets. The outer seeds were falling off and I am not sure how long the hole will hold before the string cuts through.
The chickadees were not overly impressed. They let me know right away that they didn’t appreciate having to swing on the cookie while trying to get a seed from it. All I heard from them was “tweedle deet, tweedle deet”. I tried to hang the remaining cookies in such a way so the birdies had another branch close enough to sit on.
I had bought the gelatin (it comes in a box with 4 packets) a long time ago and thought I would make the cookies with my nieces but it never happened. They tend to come over more often in summer but we ended up doing other things. With the gelatin, the cookies should stay together even in the heat of summer. My other suet can only be left out when the colder weather arrives or it ends up melting.
Maybe my next batch will be Christmas shapes and I can hang them from our evergreen trees as ornaments.
This project took very little time and got me outside for a bit. I was lucky to see a group of about ten American Tree Sparrows while I was out. They are another rare bird for this area in late fall and I was able to watch them as they hopped around on our now frozen pond. I tried tossing them some peanuts; they investigated but didn’t take any. Who knows, maybe they will try the bird cookie I left hanging nearby.