Making Your Garden Even More Bird Friendly


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If you want to make your garden as friendly for birds as you can, there are some concrete things that you can add to it beyond the basics of food, water, and shelter to make it a virtual paradise for them.

Birds love trees. They are able to set up their nesting in them as well as provide them with safe spots high above the ground to rest while they look for food. But, if your garden doesn't have trees, you can give them similar benefits by setting up perches in your yard. Although, primarily used by pet owners as a resting place for their bird when outside of his cage, bird perches are perfect accessories for the birds visiting your garden as well.

Think about planting annuals in your garden. In addition to providing a bright and colorful look to your garden, many of the seeds from annuals are food sources for birds. However, once the flowers are spent, don't trim them off as many gardeners do. Leaving them natural will ensure that when the summer rolls to its end that the birds have plenty of seeds from the annuals to help them prepare themselves for the winter.

Your garden should have plenty of bushes and trees, but they should be located mainly on the edges and sides of the garden. Leave the center mostly as lawn or grass area. This center area provides the creatures with plenty of room to be out in the open where they can hunt for insects while, at the same time, making it hard for predators to sneak up on therm because of the wide unobstructed grassy area.

Having a pile of old logs on the edges of your yard is nice touch also, even if you don't have a fireplace. Many insects and bugs are attracted to wooden structures. The birds in your yard may find this one of their favorite eating places once they notice many of the bugs congregating there.

A composter is a great for creating natural fertilizer for the plants in your yard. Birds also love them. They will take full advantage of some of the food scraps that you throw on the composter pile.

And once you have created the perfect garden for your bird friends, don't forget to enjoy it yourself.

If you are a true bird lover and have set up your yard with bird houses, feeders, bird baths, and all sorts of other amenities to attract birds to your yard, you should seriously consider buying a desk diary and documenting each bird that you see in your garden. Document the bird species, how many, the time of day, and the date. Also, take pictures and store them along with the diary. You may be surprised at the fond memories that these give you in your later years.

Birds: Some Facts About These Fascinating Creatures


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Among all the groups of creatures in the world, birds are probably the most beloved ones. Everybody loves birds, they roost and nest on our buildings and trees and we love to watch them. They are easy to find and observe. They are colorful and good singers! Who doesn't love them?

The total number of birds on the planet are difficult to estimate since the number fluctuates seasonally, but an accurate guess would be around 100,000 - 200,000 adult birds in 9,703 species divided in 23 orders and 142 families, from the poles to the tropics.

Red-billed Quelea is known to be the most common wild bird from the south of the Sahara in Africa. Millions of these birds are killed every year to control their numbers. Red Jungle Fowl, which is seen as the common domestic chicken, is the most common bird in all over the world. The European House Sparrow is the most widespread commonly seen wild bird. It has been transported by the European settlers and now you can see them in two thirds of countries, even in Australia, New Zealand, India, Europe and North America.

The heaviest bird, Dromornis Stirtoni from Australia lived some 1-15 million years, was 500 kg and 3m tall. The tallest bird was Dinornus Maximus from New Zealand. The bird with the longest wingspan, 6 meters, is the Giant Teratorn from South America. The smallest bird, 1.6g, is the Bee Hummingbird from Cuba. Another small bird is the little Woodstar from South America. They both fly competently. The smallest bird which cannot fly is the Inaccessible Island Rail. You can find it in the south Atlantic Tristan de Cunha Islands.

When you start to watch birds, one thing you will notice is that they are present only for some of the time; around 1,500 - 4,000 species of birds migrate. Some travel south in winter, some don't. Most of the time this is not migration, but dispersal which is caused by a population boom. This can occur every 4 - 10 years. Another irregular eruption is caused by the destruction or loss of food.

A major factor in many birds life is seasonal migration, involving long distances. It is known that Swifts, Swallows and some small Passerines are migratory birds. You can see them in summer but not in winter. Likewise ducks and geese are only seen in winter in the UK. They return to the north in summer to breed. It is not very well known that some of the regular birds are migrants as well. Robins and Starlings for example, either leave or come to Britain during the winter. In general, birds move to the south. But we never have a time of the year that we do not see any birds around. That's because when some of the birds living in our area migrate to the south, their northern cousins also move to the south to be our guests for the winter. And we enjoy watching these fascinating creatures throughout the year.

Window Mounted Bird Feeders Bring the Birds Up Close


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Window mounted bird feeders are wonderful for people who are home or facility bound or that wish to bird-watch while they work in the home or office. These feeders bring the birds into easy view from inside a building. They are generally held in place on the window with rubber suction cups. You can draw the birds of your choice with a variety of platform, suet, oriole or hummingbird window mount bird feeders. To properly mount your feeder be sure the glass is clean and then soak the suction cups in hot water until they are pliable. The feeder will stay put, yet they are so simple to remove if the need arises.

Some people have expressed the concern that window mounted bird feeders may lead to more window collision deaths or injuries for their birds. This could not be farther from the truth as the feeder breaks up the reflective qualities of the glass, causing the birds to slow down as they approach the feeder to eat. We have more problems with the birds leaving the feeders 15 feet away from our sliding glass door on our patio when a cat or hawk passes through the yard. We have never had a casualty as a result of any of our window mounted bird feeders.

Window mounted bird feeders are a nice solution to the problem of being home or office bound. They allow a person to observe, up close, a wide variety of the local birds and it assists in keeping one's mind sharp with the process of identifying your feeder visitors.

Do You Feed the Birds in your Garden?


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Putting a bird feeder in your garden is a very kind thing to do. It is getting harder and harder for birds to find food in urban areas - not only in winter, but all year round - and so bird feeders can often save their lives. They are also great for birdwatching, if that's what you're into, especially if you leave the bird feeder in the same place for a long time so that the birds start to remember where it is.

But what kind of bird feeder should you get? The simplest bird feeders are just tables for you to put food on, but the food you put on these is easily stolen by squirrels, who will keep coming back for more and burying it all over your garden. You should consider a cage feeder, where the food is inside a cage so that birds need to use their beaks to get it, or perhaps a feeder with a specially-designed perch that will collapse under the weight of a squirrel. However, both of these options can be impractical if you want to feed larger birds, so you need to consider whether it's really worth it or if you might as well just put out more food.

The other thing you should think about is what you're going to put in your bird feeder. Obviously this depends mainly on what kind of birds you expect to attract. Most birds will prefer seeds such as millet, but meat-eating birds will prefer 'bird cake' and a few birds like hummingbirds want a mixture of sugar and water (a kind of substitute nectar). Some birds also like to eat fruit, so you might try leaving pieces of apple or orange in the mixture as well. If you're not sure which birds will come, then the best thing to do is to have a little of everything at first, and then see what is popular.

Best Life Products


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The best products to protect avian life

The tube bird feeders can be used to protect the song birds. This might be a bit noisy for some people but they are beautiful creatures that are fully deserving of protection. With the tube bird feeders you get that protection at an affordable price. People tend to feed the song birds even when they feel that they might be a bit audible in their presence. This is because they generally appreciate the fruits of nature and the fact that we can have access to such beautiful creatures within the relative comfort of our homes. It is not a revolutionary thing to do but one which is based on an understanding of the dynamics that drive the tube bird feeders and their quarry. It is also possible that some people actually enjoy the sound that is made by the song birds. It wakes you up in the morning and tells you that you are in a place where natural beauty is abundant. This pleasure does not have to be limited to people that live in rural areas.

Some of the so called town children do not know anything about the abundant nature that surrounds them. They are used to sitting in a car and being driven to school. They never get to have a walk or to think about the avian life around them such as the song birds. In fact they might think that this is something of an irritation. That is why it is a good idea to have the tube bird feeders within the home. The children will get a chance to see all the creatures that come in to see the tube bird feeders or to get food from them. You have to ensure that you have the right holes and perches in the tube feeders so that the creatures have the opportunity to feed from them. You can hang the tube bird feeders in the trees for easy access or you can place them on a lower contraption. These are relatively simple things that do not have particular decorative elements. However if you make the tube bird feeders from home, it is possible to make them more decorative in their appearance.

There are some features that you cannot do without out when it comes to tube bird feeders. The feeder ought to be squirrel resistant because they will want to get in on the act and might even attack the birds as they come to feed. You also have to be wary of the larger animals that come into play so that you can prevent them from causing some difficulties for the people that are involved in such a venture. The perches have to be lightweight so that they can only support the birds. When a larger animal falls on them, they should be able to collapse so that that animal does not get the chance to feed. This is to ensure that the tube bird feeders are exclusive in the animals that they feed.