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Bird Habitats In Your Garden
Bird lovers must realize that they need to provide food as well as shelter to the birds from storms for the bird to be a part of their Garden in winter. Friendly wild life landscaping choices can obtained from Donna Cuin the horticulturist, at the extension office. Master Gardener's expertise will guide anyone and even and encourages wild life landscaping.
Birdhouses are a common choice to provide shelter for birds. The size of the hole to the bird house also plays an important role. Small bird such as the chickadees and nuthatches like birdhouses and require small holes to enter the birdhouse. If the holes are too big then the starlings and house sparrows can get in. Wily raccoons may also reach their hands in as well.
Feeding the birds is another important factor. The first priority is water. All you need is to provide a bowl for water and fill it when it's empty. The best is to provide for fresh water early in the morning. At night the temperatures can be freezing and breaking ice could be troublesome at times. If you already have a bird bath in which you provide water for birds in the summer months then you could use a heater for the winter months to prevent ice from forming. A reminder to bird enthusiast is to keep the feeders and utensils clean as mold or general dirty conditions can spread disease. Take extra care when large numbers come to the feeding and watering equipment as they can make the place dirty.
Since the vegetation and the insects are gone during the winter months you need to provide food for the birds. They must have enough food to keep their bodies warm and active for the long cold months. Sunflower seeds have a high fat and oil content and are helpful in these lean months. The black oilseed kind of sunflowers is preferable.
A mixture of fine cracked corn and white millet, and sunflower seeds would be ideal. Regular bird seed sold at stores has red millet, which is not that preferred by bird so it is better you make you your feed but be sure to crack it into small pieces.
The best place for the bird feeder is where it can see everything around; be it a cat or hawk. You must provide a place where the bird can escape to shelter. Place the feeder where wind is less and where squirrels cannot get it. You could also provide shrubs and trees that provide fruit during this season. They can be like like crab apples, pinon pine, currants, juniper, sand cherries, wild plums, and wild roses.
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