Enthusiastic watchers of backyard birds appreciate the value of bird feeders as an integral part of the backyard landscape.. So now when there is bird food there is bound to be squirrels; welcome or not. The solution to the issue of squirrels taking the food meant for the birds is a squirrel proof bird feeder . Allow me to share some squirrel facts to take into account.
Squirrels are agile, bold and persistent. They are rodents; so their teeth never stop growing and adults have to have up to a couple of pounds of food per week. They are great at scaling a large range of materials, like bricks. The more challenging the accessibility to feed, the more they turn into super squirrels – seriously clever athletes. They are rarely outwitted, though they can be deterred and diverted.
Look at the best feeder styles and best location in your back garden – at all times bearing in mind that squirrels can easily jump roughly 10 feet over a gap, jump as high as 5 feet from the ground and are happy falling 11 feet from a height!
Bird feeders may either be hanging or pole-mounted. Choose to suspend them from an isolated branch of a deciduous tree (because it has less thick leaf-cover than pine trees) or you can try hanging them from a wire in between a couple of trees (although doing this renders refilling fairly hard). Make sure you hang from a metal chain or wire and hook, or else the squirrels may gnaw through the cord to make the feeder fall down.
A very good squirrel guard is a squirrel baffle . Constructed from either plastic or metal, it forms an umbrella over the top of both suspended and pole-mounted feeders. The squirrels simply slide off them. Baffles may also be set up about four feet above the ground underneath pole-mounted feeders – greasing the pole with Vaseline will also be effective.
Caged bird feeders are a great option because they allow small birds access to the feed, at the same time as keeping out squirrels and larger birds as well.
You can decide on more advanced squirrel proof bird feeders. They are activated by weight. Whenever a squirrel jumps on one, a spring system causes a metal screen to descend over the feeder or its perches give way. Yet another, which is also incredibly amusing to observe, has a battery-driven motor that spins the squirrel (safely) off it.
Squirrels eat a wide array of foods, but an additional technique to keep them away is to give the birds safflower seed, thistle seed (niger), and /or pure suet (without seed), for the reason that they are just not particularly inclined to eat them.
However, you could look at this situation from a wholly different angle and purchase some squirrel feeders – incuding trapeze, tightrope and springboard. You can offer squirrels their favored foods in return for the squirrels staging a great circus spectacle for anyone watching. Hence while they are sidetracked, the birds are able to have a meal also – everybody comes out on top.
Let’s be honest, squirrels will always be a component of backyard gardens, and when combined with proper planning of bird feeder types, placement and types of bird food, we can make certain not only that the birds get what they deserve but also that we are kept amused by comic squirrel performances.