Help birds survive the heavy rain and severe gales with this fat coated bird food
Mar 9th, 2008 by Birdy Trish
All our British birds have faced force 9 gales and some sub zero temperatures this winter.
We cannot let these garden birds down just when Spring and the summer are waiting round the corner for them.
Severe weather warnings have issued.
Gusts of wind of up to 80mph are expected to tear through parts of England tonight and Monday.
I’ve just seen that people are being warned to stay indoors tomorrow and avoid unnecessary journies.
It is best to take the advice given, but could we step outdoors just for a moment to feed the birds?
I know I will. I’ll prepare the food now. See my recipe at the bottom of this note.
Think how frail birds are.
A wren
A wren weighs the same as one pound coin.
Wrens eat insects but I’ve seen one taking cheese and seed from my ground feeder.
The coal tit.
A House Sparrow
Sadly, I have held a dead sparrow and I was amazed how slight, tiny and almost weightless it was.
Birds can’t stay indoors and avoid unnecessary journies.
Always outdoors.
I often wonder how birds find food in gale force winds without being blown away, without being tossed by the wind like a leaf.
Weather forecast says heavy rain and severe gales could be the strongest storm of the winter. There have been warnings of disruption to transport and power supply networks.
We can shelter from the storm and hopefully we can feed the birds and help them survive the storm.
We’ve had a lot of windy days this winter. I was fed up with watching the wind blowing bird seed out of the hanging bird feeders (through the feeder portals). The wind just took the bird seed and scattered it up and away into the force of the gale.
I was also fed up with bird seed being blown off bird tables.
I seem to get fed up a lot these
I found the solution to my problem and hope it helps you as well.
Click this link and it will take you to how I keep bird seed on a bird table
I’ve also printed the bird food recipe details below (otherwise known as the ‘no fatball’ fatball -
- melt lard in a frying pan and
- pour the lard over any type of bird food which has been placed in an old metal container.
- Mix the melted lard and the bird seed together. Let the lard set round the bird seed. Don’t bother making it into fat balls.
- Put chunks and chunks of this heavy, set mixture on the bird tables and
- keep the bird tables topped up all day with this mixture as the hanging bird feeders may be out of action due to the wind
I know it sounds like a fat ball, but it’s not.
The lard coats the bird seed and makes it into a block which is softer than a fat ball. This has five good points -
- Obviously it’s good because it stops the bird food blowing away
- It gives the birds much needed fat in a winters day
- It only takes a minute to do. Melt fat then pour over bird food.
- There is no need to measure. It’s easy to tell when there is enough fat coating the bird seed
- Any bird food can be used. I put a general mixture and included peanuts but there other bird food you can use.
Lets feed the birds. The fresh air will do us good!
Tags: bird_food, gale, gale_force
