flowerbug
Garden Master
i don't think i've seen one of those here. it is pretty open so they are more likely in the woods up the road.
Birds
- Thread starter AMKuska
- Start date
i don't think i've seen one of those here. it is pretty open so they are more likely in the woods up the road.
Dahlia
Deeply Rooted
My daughter also gets lots of birds at her house. She has a large bird feeder on her back deck and nearly every time I look out the window I will see one to five birds dining at the feeder!
peteyfoozer
Garden Addicted
Your photos are stunning!
peteyfoozer
Garden Addicted
At my home in Tehachapi, I had a couple pair of Orioles that came back every year. I also had a really cute woodpecker couple. The male looked like he was wearing a tux. I had quite a few really cool birds that called my backyard home.
Here, we are in sone kind of flyway where all kinds of birds travel through. They don’t really stay. Even with the huge variety of birds I don’t see many in the yard. Mostly just sparrows who like to nest above my porch and poop on everything 😳.
This year, I have hardly seen any birds at all, not even hummers. Although SOMEBODY is eating all the seed I put out.
But if you go out on the ranch, there are pheasants and trumpeter swans and sandhill, cranes, and herons and meadowlarks, which are my absolute favorite, because I love to hear them sing, and the funny fat bird with the long, skinny, hooked beak that I forget the name of. And of course we have a lot of raptors. My livestock guardian dogs were kept very busy and I come to think of it, I haven’t even seen any crows, but one thing we do have is all kinds owls. great horned, owls, barn, owls, screech owls they’re all here.❤️
I need to think of someway to get more birds to come in my yard so I can see them. anybody got any ideas I’m open
Here, we are in sone kind of flyway where all kinds of birds travel through. They don’t really stay. Even with the huge variety of birds I don’t see many in the yard. Mostly just sparrows who like to nest above my porch and poop on everything 😳.
This year, I have hardly seen any birds at all, not even hummers. Although SOMEBODY is eating all the seed I put out.
But if you go out on the ranch, there are pheasants and trumpeter swans and sandhill, cranes, and herons and meadowlarks, which are my absolute favorite, because I love to hear them sing, and the funny fat bird with the long, skinny, hooked beak that I forget the name of. And of course we have a lot of raptors. My livestock guardian dogs were kept very busy and I come to think of it, I haven’t even seen any crows, but one thing we do have is all kinds owls. great horned, owls, barn, owls, screech owls they’re all here.❤️
I need to think of someway to get more birds to come in my yard so I can see them. anybody got any ideas I’m open
Dahlia
Deeply Rooted
Maybe sprinkle a trail of bird seed from the ranch to your yard to lure the birds in?! 😉
peteyfoozer
Garden Addicted
I wonder how much an 840 mile trail of birdseed would cost? 🤔
Dahlia
Deeply Rooted
Dahlia
Deeply Rooted
Lol!
flowerbug
Garden Master
birdbath in the middle of a fairly open area where you can see it. rinse it out each morning. clean it better once in a while when needed (i bleach it after blowing out all the water with the hose and then cover it for a while as i do something else and then i come back and rinse out the bleach and fill it back up and then enjoy the show again). i use a scrub brush and rinse that out and then add the bleach, it doesn't take much, just a few tablespoons is plenty then brush that around for a few moments before letting it sit. i don't feed the birds because i want them to forage for bugs and weed seeds in the gardens.
having a regular water supply they can rely upon seems to help cut down on random damage to fruits and veggies from the birdies (i've never seen any obvious signs of damage to the tomatoes) but i cannot say for sure that they don't get into the strawberries because i've rarely been getting much of a strawberry crop the past few years. i know for sure the raccoons and chipmunks are raiding the strawberry patch but i don't usually see too many birds in there...
if you really get a lot of bird traffic you may need to rinse it out twice a day... ours can get rather muddy quick during the dry spells and really dirty at other times as some birds will disgorge their baby chicks poos in the birdbaths. yick. oh, and during berry season they can get messy too... we're at the time now where the honeysuckles are ripe and there's plenty of those ending up in the birdbaths...
digitS'
Garden Master
I'm a little surprised that you have sparrows, @peteyfoozer . I'm assuming those are House Sparrows. It's that there would be very many rather than few but, then again, you have horses and my understanding is that this is how we came to have House Sparrows all across North America. Perhaps, they should be known as "Horse" Sparrows.
As horses became less commonly associated with human settlements, these birds adjusted – with great success. Of course, people began to make efforts to feed them. I have always been unwilling to do so. There are so many in my neighborhood that they can be a pest in the garden. Of course, they also eat bugs. They sure seem able to flit from plant plant in search of 6-legged pests.
Some sort of feeding station here that would attract native birds and leave the sparrows to their own devices would be most appropriate. All seed eaters seem to like sunflowers. Sparrows have a little trouble with them but it doesn't stop them from taking them from the mature plants if those are left in the garden. I would say that millet is a sparrow attractant, although we also drew in small flocks of House Finches when I was late with the garden harvest.
Dad would set up unhulled sunflower and niger seed feeders. He was able to attract quite a variety of birds.
Steve
As horses became less commonly associated with human settlements, these birds adjusted – with great success. Of course, people began to make efforts to feed them. I have always been unwilling to do so. There are so many in my neighborhood that they can be a pest in the garden. Of course, they also eat bugs. They sure seem able to flit from plant plant in search of 6-legged pests.
Some sort of feeding station here that would attract native birds and leave the sparrows to their own devices would be most appropriate. All seed eaters seem to like sunflowers. Sparrows have a little trouble with them but it doesn't stop them from taking them from the mature plants if those are left in the garden. I would say that millet is a sparrow attractant, although we also drew in small flocks of House Finches when I was late with the garden harvest.
Dad would set up unhulled sunflower and niger seed feeders. He was able to attract quite a variety of birds.
Steve
