Homemade bird food

Nancy Carter
Nancy Carter Posts: 202 ✭✭✭
edited December 2020 in DIY Tutorials

I am looking for recipes to make bird food for the winter months. I am not sure what ingredients to mix together. Its getting cold out here and I see the birds flitting around eagerly! I have been feeding them thistle, sunflower seeds and during the summer I had put out a nut and berry blend. Looking for suggestions!

Comments

  • jowitt.europe
    jowitt.europe Posts: 1,465 admin

    I would also be interested in making bird food. I have dried leftovers from making juice from my own apples, carrots and cucumbers. I am just thinking whether I could give them to birds. Whether it would not make them thirsty and the dried fruit would swell in the body. When birds are thirsty, do they use snow for quenching the thirst?

    I buy seed and nut mixture for the birds, but it would be nice to make something myself. I know one should not give birds anything with salt as the salt upsets their stomachs. I think it is wrong to give them leftovers of bread, because bread is usually made with salt. One should not give salted bacon for tits, only raw one... but this is the end of my knowledge.

    could one give natural homemade butter to tits? They love fat.

  • Tave
    Tave Posts: 952 ✭✭✭✭✭

    These recipes looked good. The second mentioned that if you are going to use dried fruit to soak it before putting it out for the birds, so it doesn't swell in their stomach. And a couple of the recipes do have peanut butter.

  • Nancy Carter
    Nancy Carter Posts: 202 ✭✭✭

    @jolanta.wittib thank you...these are great!!

  • Nancy Carter
    Nancy Carter Posts: 202 ✭✭✭

    @Tave great articles thank you!

  • jowitt.europe
    jowitt.europe Posts: 1,465 admin

    @Tave thank you! Very useful articles and I found answers to all my questions

    @Nancy Carter thank you for raising this discussion

  • shllnzl
    shllnzl Posts: 1,820 ✭✭✭✭✭

    The soaking dried fruit recommendation stops me in my tracks: dried and dehydrated fruit is part of various mixes that I provide to my parrot.

    Dehydrated fruit has much less moisture than dried.

    Available water supplies might make a difference in the decision on fruit usage.