Black oil sunflower seeds vs the no-mess blend. Picked the blend. Now my feeder is a ghost town.

Spent an extra $8 on the shell-free blend figuring less cleanup, more birds. Put it out three days ago. The cardinals and finches that normally swarm my feeder are gone. Only a couple of doves pick at the ground scraps. Tempted to dump the bag and go back to the basic seeds. Has anyone else had birds snub the fancy mixes?

2 comments

2 Comments

thomas_johnson13d ago

Huh, really? I gotta disagree with you here. The birds aren't snubbing the fancy mix because it's bad, they're snubbing it because it's different from what they know. Cardinals especially are creatures of habit. You yanked their usual spot and swapped in something unfamiliar. Give it another week before you dump the bag. The doves are already testing it, and the others will come around once they see it's safe. I switched to a shell-free blend last winter and had the same dead zone for about five days. Then the chickadees started hitting it, then the titmice, and finally the cardinals joined in after two weeks. The key is patience. That $8 extra is worth it for no hulls piling up under the feeder.

roses6913d ago

Yeah thats EXACTLY how it goes with so many things in life honestly. I think @thomas_johnson is right that its a habit thing not a taste thing. Birds are just like us when we get attached to a certain brand of coffee or that one diner we always go to on Saturday mornings. If someone swapped my regular breakfast spot for some trendy new place I'd probably pout for a week too before giving it a real chance. The same thing happens with my neighbor's cat who refused to touch a new food bowl for like ten days because the old one had a chip in it. So yeah give it time, the cardinals are just being stubborn and they WILL come around once they decide the new mix isnt a threat.