Tag Archives: Birds

Bird Feeding Tips From Ben and Mark Cullen

Cardinal Photo - Sonya Dittkrist

Mark & Ben Cullen Garden Tips

As we peer out the window this time of year, we are grateful for the birds that visit the seed heads of the ornamental grasses that we let stand over the winter.  We are so glad that we resisted the temptation to cut them down this past fall.

For the birds in your yard, now is the perfect time to attract song sparrows, chickadees and overwintering Blue Jays and Cardinals with a ‘songbird seed mix’.  Or just use straight black oil sunflower seeds.  To prevent the mess associated with sunflowers, use the hulled variety – more expensive but all ‘meat’ and no waste or mess to clean up.

Winter feeding birds need the carbohydrates and fats contained in suet.  Extra calories are a must for birds whose fast metabolisms are working hard to keep their little bodies warm.  We always hang several out for the winter.  That way, if we don’t replace one of them after it is finished, the birds always have another to feed on.

The location of your feeders is just as important as the food that goes into them: out of the harsh winter winds and, ideally, close to shelter.  Shelter can be anything from a tall evergreen pine to a short deciduous bush.  Birds will use this as protection from predators but also to determine whether or not this food source is safe.  If you watch the birds, you’ll notice they don’t fly straight to the feeder, they will perch a ways away and observe the area first.

Choose feeders with large weather protection covers.  This will keep your seed from collecting snow and ice and keep the birds a little warmer while eating.  Larger feeders are better than small ones in the winter.  You will be out there less often refilling it, which can be a challenge if it snows up to your knees overnight.

If you don’t have a problem with squirrels in the spring and summer months, we would suggest putting out an open feeder closer to the ground.  Use a mix of black sunflower and nyjer seed to appeal to a larger variety of birds.  Mourning doves, juncos, and even pheasants are more suited to eating from the ground.

Because squirrels don’t hibernate, they are still likely to find your winter feeders, just as they may have done with your summer feeders.  Squirrel-proof feeders are easy to find and most of them work pretty well.  If your squirrels seem to outsmart every feeder on the market, you might as well just feed them.  Provide them with in-shell peanuts a distance away from your bird feeders, keep it stocked, and your bird feeders will be more likely to feed the birds than the squirrels.

Looking for information on Canadian birds, visit: www.birdscanada.org

For more advice and answers to over 10,000 gardening questions sign up for Mark and Ben’s free monthly newsletter.

Photo by: Sonya Dittkrist

Amplify the Bird Song in Your Garden (From Mark & Ben Cullen)

Bluejay

Garden Tips From Mark & Ben

In the chorus that is a living garden, our favourite section is the singing birds. A breeze through tall grass, the crunch of gravel underfoot and a frog croaking, all play their part in this living soundtrack.

Nothing can stop us in our tracks like birdsong. We were reminded of this when we walked through the feature gardens at Canada Blooms March 13th.   (canadablooms.com for an amazing video) Yes, this was the edition of our famous festival that no one was able to see, other than a handful of us organisers and the contractors.

Back to the birds in your garden. Our favourite way to promote and enjoy birds is bringing them right into the backyard by providing food and habitat.

Here is what we recommend:
o   Plants are a one-stop shop for food and shelter. Birds prefer fruits and seeds right off the plant, and most birds either build their nests in a tree, shrub or stand of grass, or they make their nests from pieces of it.

o   Flowers such as asters, black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia), Echinacea (purple coneflower) and coreopsis, not only add colour to your yard but attract a range of songbirds from cardinals to colourful finches. Leave perennials standing throughout the winter so they can continue to be foraged and cut them down in the spring.

o    Native ornamental grasses attract sparrows, finches and other small birds that forage for seeds. Robins and sparrows pick up coarse blades to construct the main walls of their nest, then revisit for finer-textured blades to pad the soft lining of the interior. We recommend planting big bluestem, little bluestem, northern sea oats or side oats. Like your perennials, leave these grasses standing through the winter to provide habitat for overwintering species such as dark eyed juncos.

o    Robins, waxwings and cardinals build nests in shrubs, eating and singing like old friends at a Maritime kitchen party. Mulberries and serviceberries are two medium-sized, summer-fruiting shrubs/small trees that are especially popular with this crowd. Flowering dogwood bears fruit in the fall to keep them coming, as does crab apple, which also fruits in the fall but holds its fruit into the winter for foraging cedar wax wings.

o   Trees are the bird equivalent of a tall condo building, bustling with life. White oaks provide nesting opportunities to woodpeckers, jays and even wood ducks, and unlike other oaks, white oak produce acorns every year. Native tree species are found to support more bird life. We recommend red maple or black, red and white spruce, gray, white and yellow birch or black willow, if you have lots of space.

Once you have created a bountiful bird food-garden, supplement with the right bird feed.

Here are our guidelines for a great “feeding” experience:

  •  Birds will forgive you for letting the feeders go empty. People worry that the birds depend on them for feeder-food. While a feeder helps bring birds to your yard, it will only ever be one of many food sources they depend on, so don’t race home from the cottage to fill your bird feeders.
  • Buy seed based on the birds you wish to attract. The following guidelines by BSC will help you understand what type of feed will attract the birds you want:

o   Black oil sunflower seed will attract cardinal, black-capped Chickadee, Mourning Dove, Dark-eyed Junco, song sparrow and common Grackle.

o   Suet and bird peanuts attract Blue jay, red-breasted nuthatch, Downy Woodpecker, White-breasted Nuthatch, Hairy Woodpecker. Avoid “human peanuts” as the salt is harmful to birds.

o   Nyjer/ black oil sunflower will attract the smaller house finch, American Goldfinch, Purple Finch, Common Redpoll, Pine Siskin.

With enough food and places to make nest, remember water. This is extremely important as birds, like humans, need to drink and bathe.

For more details visit our library and word-search “birds” at www.markcullen.com, and for more advice and answers to over 10,000 gardening questions sign up for Mark and Ben’s free monthly newsletter.

p.s. looking for tips on growing food during COVID-19? Check out our Food Gardening Tips at http://markcullen.com/practical-tips-from-mark-and-ben-cullen/.

Mark and Ben’s To Do List: Late Winter

Cardinal

Garden Tips From Mark & Ben

After enjoying time off for the holiday season, we are looking forward to the year ahead. Some suggestions that will get your gardening season off to an early and fine start:

1. Feed the birds. Use a quality seed mix so that it does not get wasted and you attract quality birds.  We recommend Mark’s Choice Bird Feast (and the other products in the line up) exclusive to Home Hardware.

You will pay more for Mark’s Choice bird seed. And you will get more
birds.  Customer testimonials tell us so.

2. Enjoy your amaryllis. And enter our contest. As the blooms finish, cut them off, stem included. But keep the long, strap-like leaves intact as they are the ‘food factory’ of the bulb, converting energy in the sun into plant sugars that beef up the bulb so that it will bloom again next winter. Isn’t Mother Nature amazing?

3. Buy seeds. Whether you choose to shop the seed catalogues (of which we have many. Ontario Seed and Veseys in PEI are favourites) or peruse the seed racks at your local Home Hardware (where you will find 8 premium seed varieties in the Mark’s Choice line up) be sure to do it soon.

First, you are only going to get busier as the gardening season
approaches and this job does not get easier when you are time-stressed.

Secondly, the selection is at its best. Don’t be disappointed.

4. Don’t start seeds. Unless you are growing geraniums or impatiens (do people still grow impatiens?) which should be started later this month. Seed starting becomes a priority next month.

For more advice and answers to over 10,000 gardening questions, visit www.markcullen.com and sign up for Mark and Ben’s free monthly newsletter.