Help birds with nesting mataerial

[Euan Buchan]

I've read in a few bird books that birds nesting in your garden could go over & take a few supplies of the thing you've hang up on them. Last weekend my Mum put some wolly stuff or somthing in a little net & stuck it on a tree but that didn't work the wool just feel out. What do you think is better? Ive heard moss is better or hair if you just had a haircut.

[IanF]

Hair is good, dog and cat hair seems quite popular with our Blue Tits. We usually find they've used bit's of wool and string as well as long grass clippings dried out. Every few years we buy cotton wool nesting material which we hang out. The tits certainly love it and even Dunnock and Goldfinch pull bits off.

With the wool, I'd suggest pulling a bit out and leaving it on top of a wall or the soil surface of a container tubs. Blackbirds certainly find it easier to collect stuff that way.

[Mary Evelyn]

Our dogs hair is really popular and bits of soft hay which we buy and spread out under the bushes out back. :D

[Wendy Morris]

Our dogs hair is really popular and bits of soft hay which we buy and spread out under the bushes out back. :D

Yes, same here. We have two Springer Spaniels who are moulting like crazy at the moment, just the right time to stuff it in a peanut holder, tuck it in holes in trees and fix to bushes. Popular all round.

[scubapauly]

I couldn't believe it yesterday, as I watched a bluetit carefully make his way down from treetop to ground level, always looking out for danger, all the way down behind a plant pot to pick up some of our dogs hair. I'm stlll new to this gardening and birding stuff. I gave one of the dogs a good brush and stuck the fur in a peanut feeder. Great way to recycle and bring wildlife into the garden.

[Cathy H]

I leave the cats fur out for the birds and they love it. On the ex-beeb forum some folk have had birds stealing the moss from their hanging baskets too.

[Mangetout]

I shoved a handful of fresh hay (stolen from a bag I bought to feed to my guinea pigs) into the top branches of a shrub and I have observed birds taking it away for nesting material. I have also had similar results with lengths of soft cotton thread which I unpicked by hand from a square of coarse cotton canvas and short pieces of knitting wool.

[Twitterhead]

The greenfinches were enthusiastic collectors of the dog hair I put out while an industrious blue tit has stripped a hanging basket of ALL its moss - they should have some nice cosy nests!

[birdtree]

The dog hair that I put out this year was even taken by some jackdaws, but the blue tits and great tits took the most

[bizarredorothy]

My mum also hangs out dog hair for the birds, she pegs it to her washing line and then watches the birds come to collect it. she has a huge GSD so there's plenty of fur to go round