The birds are eating the bird seed and peanuts in our garden in Kent very
quickly,

The rate of consumption is much quicker than I have seen before.

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why this is
happening?

--
Michael Chare

Michael Chare wrote:
The birds are eating the bird seed and peanuts in our garden in Kent
very quickly,

The rate of consumption is much quicker than I have seen before.

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why this
is happening?

I've noticed the same from one of those squirrel-proof feeders that look
like a cage around the feeder itself. Then noticed that a rather fat
pigeon has found out how to fly onto the nearby fence, fly up to and
hang on to the feeder causing to to wobble all over the place and spill
seed on the ground. Fly back down to the ground to feast on the seed.
Rinse and repeat.

Does it have a relation in Kent or is there some sort of Pigeon Internet
for the dissemination of useful pigeon information.?

Andrew

On Jul 30, 5:15*pm, Andrew May wrote:
Michael Chare wrote:
The birds are eating the bird seed and peanuts in our garden in Kent
very quickly,

The rate of consumption is much quicker than I have seen before.

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why this
is happening?

I've noticed the same from one of those squirrel-proof feeders that look
like a cage around the feeder itself. Then noticed that a rather fat
pigeon has found out how to fly onto the nearby fence, fly up to and
hang on to the feeder causing to to wobble all over the place and spill
seed on the ground. Fly back down to the ground to feast on the seed.
Rinse and repeat.

Does it have a relation in Kent or is there some sort of Pigeon Internet
for the dissemination of useful pigeon information.?

Andrew

Yes, there's even an RFC for data packets by pigeon.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over_Avian_Carriers


NT

Michael Chare wrote:
The birds are eating the bird seed and peanuts in our garden in Kent
very quickly,

The rate of consumption is much quicker than I have seen before.

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why this
is happening?

I've only just started feeding the birds this year, so don't have any
historical consumption rates to compare with, however, I agree that
our standard size peanut feeders are getting emptied pretty well every
week. We do have the occasional visit from a woodpecker, but it's
mostly very industrious sparrows, sometimes as many as five at a time.
Still, watching them squabble is entertaining!

Graham (Feeder outside study window so I can watch it when I'm
supposed to be working :-)

"Michael Chare" wrote in message
o.uk...
The birds are eating the bird seed and peanuts in our garden in Kent very
quickly,

The rate of consumption is much quicker than I have seen before.

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why this
is happening?


What kind of birds are you getting? There's loads of crows round these here
parts (Thanet) and plenty of magpies. More than usual, especially the crows.
I can't see how that is relevant but it's the only thing I can think of
that's different this year.

Si

On Fri, 30 Jul 2010 17:11:19 +0100, Michael Chare wrote:

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why this
is happening?

See post about clever pigeon, same could be said for squirrels or
other large birds. Have you altered anything to do with the feeder,
where it hangs, pruned nearby bushes? The wind shakes our seed feeder
enough to empty it in about 3 days. Yes it is the wind 'cause we find
the seed on the ground...

--
Cheers
Dave.

On Fri, 30 Jul 2010 17:11:19 +0100, "Michael Chare"
wrote:

The birds are eating the bird seed and peanuts in our garden in Kent very
quickly,

The rate of consumption is much quicker than I have seen before.

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why this is
happening?

We noticed that earlier this year, then I spotted a family of very
plumps rats attacking them. The rat catcher sorted that out and the
birds then got their fair share. That is, until some despicable ****
nicked all the bird feeders. The bird bath was nicked last night too.

In article ,
"Mungo \"Two Sheds\" Toadfoot" writes:

"Michael Chare" wrote in message
o.uk...
The birds are eating the bird seed and peanuts in our garden in Kent very
quickly,

The rate of consumption is much quicker than I have seen before.

Same here, but this is first time I've used peanuts.
The bird seed doesn't vanish so fast.
Both from Costco.

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why this
is happening?


What kind of birds are you getting? There's loads of crows round these here
parts (Thanet) and plenty of magpies. More than usual, especially the crows.
I can't see how that is relevant but it's the only thing I can think of
that's different this year.

My bird table in decreasing order of visitors is:

Wood pigeons
Feral pigeons
Collared doves
Crows
Magpies
Sparrows
Jays
The odd tit

A family of blackbirds around, but they seem much more
interested in digging out ant nests than in nuts.

A fox usually appears at dusk and hoovers up any peanuts
the birds have dropped into the grass.

Next door's cat got a couple of pigeons (garden looked
like there had been a pillow fight), but I've raised the
bird table and that hasn't happened again since.

The thing that amazed me was that with feathers all over
the lawn, the bird table stayed piled up with nuts for
a week and nothing came to eat them. Normally, it's
emptied in half a day. After I'd cut the grass which also
picked up most of the feathers, birds started appearing
again.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

Michael Chare :
The birds are eating the bird seed and peanuts in our garden in Kent
very quickly,

The rate of consumption is much quicker than I have seen before.

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why
this is happening?

We've had a feeder in the same place for over ten years now and it's
easy for me to keep track of the rate of consumption. The rate varies
according mainly to the season, then the daily weather, plus some factor
that I haven't been able to discern. This time of year always has the
highest rate. Currently they're eating about 1.4 kg per day, compared
with an all-year-round average of 0.4 kg.

Consumers are mainly tits, finches, sparrows, robins, nuthatches, and
woodpeckers. For a couple of years we had a one-legged blackbird who
mastered the art of feeding while hovering, humming-bird style.

Additionally we get the odd crow (inc magpies and jays), pigeon, or
squirrel. A hungry squirrel causes the consumption to go up a bit.

--
Mike Barnes

"GAP" wrote in message
...

Michael Chare wrote:
The birds are eating the bird seed and peanuts in our garden in Kent
very quickly,

The rate of consumption is much quicker than I have seen before.

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why this
is happening?

I've only just started feeding the birds this year, so don't have any
historical consumption rates to compare with, however, I agree that
our standard size peanut feeders are getting emptied pretty well every
week. We do have the occasional visit from a woodpecker, but it's
mostly very industrious sparrows, sometimes as many as five at a time.
Still, watching them squabble is entertaining!

Graham (Feeder outside study window so I can watch it when I'm
supposed to be working :-)

Sparrows? Haven't seen one of them for yonks.

Round here - Luton - it's gluts of bluetits that empty the feeder: the young
ones probably think its the only food they can eat. Sad really. Mind you,
haven't bothered this year as can't beat the squirrels. And - strangely -
we now don't get our strawberries or cherries attacked. Not such a good
idea to invite birds into the garden after all...

S

On 31/07/2010 17:12, Spamlet wrote:


Sparrows? Haven't seen one of them for yonks.

Plenty here in north Hampshire. A family of 6 or more empty our (quite
large) feeder in two days, by chucking everything on the ground until
they find a sunflower seed. The spillage is quickly eaten by dunnocks,
pigeons and collared doves.

--
Reentrant

On Fri, 30 Jul 2010 18:11:19 +0200, Michael Chare
wrote:

The birds are eating the bird seed and peanuts in our garden in Kent
very quickly,

The rate of consumption is much quicker than I have seen before.

Has anyone else noticed a similar high rate, or able to explain why this
is happening?


Yes, significantly so. In our case I an sure that it is down to the
noticeably higher number of fledglings this year compared to the last, a
lot of the local birds have had a successful second batch. According to
my weekly BTO bird counts we usually experience a drop at this time of
year, probably due to the abundance of cereal crops on nearby land for the
last few years but this year we are currently getting more than a third
more visits to the garden.

--
rbel