Missing birds (1 Viewer)

I moved into a new house in May, and we've gotten tons and tons of birds. It's so exciting coming from an apartment where we barely ever even saw birds!

Here's my question. One day, several species of birds just disappeared. I still have a million birds coming to the different feeders, but all of a sudden the blue jays, woodpeckers, and grackles are just gone. I put peanuts out every day for the blue jays, and one day they just stopped coming. I've had a piece of suet just sitting out, not even in a feeder, and there are no grackles in sight. Nothing at all has changed. They just stopped coming.

I read the post about this being a slower time of year for birds, but that really hasn't been the case. It's just those few birds that are suddenly missing. I seriously haven't even seen a grackle in probably two weeks. That just seems so weird to me. Growing up, we could never get rid of them! Any thoughts on this? I live in southern Wisconsin in the US, if that makes a difference.

Thanks for your help!

Casper

Hello there and a warm welcome to you from those of us on staff here at BirdForum :t:

Grackles never stay around long. They will eat you out of house and home while they are there though. With my Blue Jays I only see them during the breeding season and honestly, that's enough for me because my food bill averages about 35 -40 bucks a week when the BJs are around. so it is quite possible, that they have either finished breeding and moved on to a different area.

Don't feel to bad ... I've been having a similar situation. I'm thinking it's probably the time of year. I had a good group of starling, grackles, and a few red-wing black birds showing up. I also had a a red-bellied wood pecker coming on a regular basis. Now I get 0.... I've even did the same things you did. I set out suet and a woodpecker seed block and nothing came. Hopefully when it starts to cool off they will be back!

I also live in SE Wisconsin, not to far from you Casper. The birds around here seem to go in shifts also. Grackles are very numerous in spring, and again in fall, as well as the massive amounts of mixed blackbirds that come with them. Also, here, I learned this year that what I always assumed were grackles are a lot of times blackbirds, usually brewers, and in spring and fall sometimes rusty blackbirds. Have no fear, they'll be back. Summer brings lots of insects, which have a LOT more protein and food value then birdseed, so them visiting your feeders is only supplementing their diet. I still have a downy and hairy woodpecker who visit the suet everyday, and even more frequent when I put out a peanut feeder. In summer I get mostly sparrows and goldfinches, with all the other birds still around, just not as numerous. The cardinals are done breeding now, so they are around the feeders a lot more now. Same with the chickadees. Blue jays are hit and miss, some days they are here serveral times a day, some days they disappear, but peanuts in the shell are a big draw, and so is whole corn, thats if you are ok with them not eating it, but just burying it or hiding it somewhere in the yard. Your best bet in keeping as many birds as possible around is to keep the ole birdbath filled and clean.

Oh, and a note on the blackbirds and grackles, despite a lot of people not liking them, in my opinion they are ok. This is the first year where I actually encouraged them with millet and cracked corn, because I read that they eat june bugs (which my wife freaks out when she sees or hears one). I can count on one hand how many june bugs I've seen this year in my yard, well, on my patio doors at night I should say.