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Who is this on my peanut cake? (1 Viewer)

graemejw

New member
I see this bird every now & again on the peanut cake in my Greenwich back garden. As a birdwatching novice I cannot identify it from any of my books - please help.

The feeder is usually swamped with Blue Tits & Long-tailed tits, even the odd Green Woodpecker - not bad for such an urban location!!
 

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Euan will tell you..................... he's got thousands in his garden.

It's a juv Sterling ;-)
 
Shame on you Steve!!! (But you did make me laugh!)

graemejw, it's a juvenile starling, honest!!!
 
No worries it's my ignorance really - thanks for the ID. It didn't strike me that it'd be a starling - I thought they went round in great big flocks?!!
 
Starlings are like twitchers, sometimes there's so many it's scary and other times there on their own having the cake all to themselves :)
 
No juvenile starling should ever be seen on a peanut cake. No juvenile ANYTHING should be on a peanut cake.

Why do you have a peanut cake in your garden at this time of year? Why not just knock the nests down with a stick?
 
Hi jwsindub,

Nothing wrong with peanut cake. It is WHOLE peanuts that cause problems for young birds, as they can choke on them. Chopped peanuts in a cake (as is obvious in the photo - no whole peanuts there) are OK.

Michael
 
Hmmmmmmm I feel a good debate coming on!!!

I must admit I feed all year round, including whole nuts in a feeder, is this incorrect?
 
I'm told opinions have changed, they now say it's best to feed all year round, especially during the breeding season. Even the bearded birding chap from the goodies says 'all year round', as long as your nuts are crushed or in a cage feeder the adult birds wont get big nuts and little chicks wont choke.
 
Let's assume that we are all putting out the right stuff.

Then I can see no obvious reason why all year round feeding is a Bad Thing.

Also, I don't think anyone should get too hung up about missing a couple of weeks while they are in Benidorm.

The birds are adaptable, and certainly food availability we be one "consideration" when they choose their territory. Given the choice of flying 10 feet or 10 miles for suitable food, I am pretty sure they will choose 10 feet.

But if there is nothing within 10 feet, then they'll try twenty feet, and then 30 feet etc.

The only thing is, I think that in general we should provide food at all times possible, as we are gradually taking away more and more of the places where is occurs naturally.
 
Many people think that late spring and the whole of the summer is a time of plenty with flowers, pollen, insects, caterpillars all in profusion BUT birds which are exclusively nut or seed feeders can struggle to find food at this time of the year because all of last years crop has been eaten and it is generally too early for any of this years flowers etc to have produced seed etc so is it a good idea to feed all of the year round within the parameters of chopped nuts etc as described above.


Colin
 
Re: jwsindubs patronising post

I suggest you write to Sainsbury's then becuase that's where that cake came from with the RSPB's logo smothered all over it - it doesn't say anything about what time of year the cake should be hung out. There are no whole nuts in the cake either - they are pretty well mashed up.

Here am I thinking it's a good thing to give the local birds something to eat in the relatively urban surroundings we live in.

Oh well can't please everybody.............some busybody always like to stick their nose in with a holier than thou opinion.
 
hi all
feed all year just be carefull about crushing nuts ouch!!!
bert.
 
There is no point whatsoever in feeding an average garden bird during the spring and summer.

The only real reason for feeding birds during the summer is to make them hang out where the food is.

The wisdom that birds can/should be fed all year round has been changed by exactly the people who profit from it: bird food manufacturers, (who paid for the research) Sainsbury's, St. Bill d'Oddie and the RSPB.

If prawn cocktail monster munch were avaiable free on every street corner, maybe your children wouldn't eat any more, but many other people's children would. And some people's children would get nothing to eat at all except monster munch. Maybe no child would actually be killed by the wide availablity of such a treat, but I still don't think they should be eating it. Kids should eat meat and veg, not monster munch.

Baby birds eat caterpillars.:eat:
 
I was at the Gardener's World Exhibition at the NEC today, and there was some guy from the wildlife trusts doing a lecture on wildlife in the garden. He advocated year round feeding. Still no doubt the wildlife trusts are in on this money making scam to. He also reckoned that the number of bird species that visited garden feeders had risen from 17 to 90+ in last 25 years.
 
jwsindub,
I don't agree with you regarding the all year round feeding. See my post above regarding seed eaters and I'm not talking about birds that eat seeds as well as lot of other foods such as insects. Also not all baby birds eat caterpillars.

Colin
 
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