Speaking of bad manners...

[TheSeedObsesser]

We shoot both, although its not going to do much good. The starlings around here are as thick as passenger pigeons!

I'm going to go with Jared on this one if you can't shoot were you live. For woodpeckers you can try placing of those suet cubes somewhere off to the side of your existing feeder.

Darn you Shakespeare! I knew that I didn't like him for a reason!

 

[so lucky]

Some garden centers sell the "upside-down" finch feeders, in which the seed holes are below the perch, rather than above it. This prohibits lots of birds from being able to eat out of it, as the bird has to hang upside down to eat. They are made especially for goldfinches, and hold niger thistle.
Also, just the regular tube sunflower feeders seem to deter some obnoxious birds. My DH used to shoot English sparrows and starlings, but he's gotten soft hearted the last few years, and doesn't shoot them anymore. The sparrows have taken over the bluebird houses.

 

[journey11]

These are the same little birds you see fighting over stale french fries in the parking lot at Walmart. :/ I knew they were non-native, but I had no idea how brutal they are to other nesting birds until I started Googling the halo thing. It's no wonder I've seen very few bluebirds the past two years. It seems they will kill them and their babies. When we did the backyard bird count last year, my MIL ran out and bought 4 different types of birdhouses for my daughter, spending over $100 on them. I didn't get them put out last year for lack of time and lack of trees to pick from on my property too. Now I am not sure I want to put them out at all because it said you have to monitor them daily to keep the house sparrows out or they will take over and kill the other birds. MIL will not be happy with me, but I don't want to find a box full of dead baby bluebirds. I felt sorry for them until I heard that they kill other birds.

I will definitely stop filling the feeder with mixed seed and try it for awhile with boss or safflower instead, although I hear that is no guarantee. I have a finch thistle feeder I can keep out and maybe those little guys will come back to it if the sparrows are gone. Suet is still an option too. The woodpeckers, chickadees and titmice like those.

All that spilled seed will be attracting mice too. My cats are lazy and not much for mousing.

 

[Nyboy]

Tiny little birds are death with wings!!

 

[so lucky]

Between English sparrows and cow birds--I don't know which are the worst.

 

[TheSeedObsesser]

I haven't seen a cowbird since we've moved here. I guess they might have trouble with sparrow nests...

 

[digitS']

Well, I read a little about the critter .

This author seems to have done a very comprehensive search of the literature, however, the website itself is named for the Eastern Bluebird (Sialis sialis): House Sparrow History

I followed one of the articles cited to the Smithsonian magazine. This biologist takes a much more tolerant attitude toward the House Sparrow. "In the end, I cant tell you whether sparrows are good or bad. I can tell you that when sparrows are rare, we tend to like them, and when they are common, we tend to hate them." The Story of the Most Common Bird in the World

Both talk about the effort to control insects in the United States but the realization, gained just a few short years after these birds were released, that some mistake had been made.

Steve

 

[journey11]

They're just trying to survive and get by too. Unfortunately, they are much better at it than most of our indigenous bird species.

We had one earlier this fall that my cat got ahold of. He was just batting it around, torturing it, so we took it away and put it in a bucket of straw to see if it would recover. DD was so tickled to get to hold a live wild bird in her hands. It did eventually fly away. Any little creature, I can't help but feel sorry for it. I will stop feeding them though. I don't want to encourage them to stick around.

 

[so lucky]

Along the theme of bad-mannered birds, have you ever watched the you-tube videos of people taming down a starling? They are pretty smart, and can learn to talk and mimic all sorts of sounds. Might be kind of fun. (I'm getting bored, apparently)

 

[bj taylor]

I don't like sparrows or starlings either. the starlings prevent the martins from coming in & the sparrows won't let the bluebirds nest. I haven't figured out how to turn this tide.