Attract cardinals in my backyard (2 Viewers)

[Ted Y.]

I witnessed some bellicose behavior.

A cardinal discovers spilled seed under a bird feeder and begin feeding on it.
The feeder is used by a “group” of house sparrows. At once, the chirping begins. Very, very noisy. The cardinal goes away. Silence. The cardinal come back. Chirping, again. The cardinal goes away again. The sparrows descend on the ground and eat the spilled seed.

This is denial of food resources.

It is an ecosystem without cats, squirrels, and the sparrows are the dominant species in the backyard and growing in number.

I want to attract cardinals in my backyard, and here are the questions:

How can I attract cardinals?

How can I temperate/avert this aggressive behavior of sparrows? Other that removing the feeder.

 

[Tired]

You don't want cats- they're an invasive species and destructive to all native birds and most other small wildlife.

House Sparrows are also an invasive species, at least in Canada. There's not much you can do to prevent them from being feeder bullies, but there is something you can do in general. I"m not sure how popular this suggestion is going to be on this forum, but keep this in mind: House Sparrows are destructive to native bird species, as they steal nesting cavities and will even kill the birds already nesting inside. With that in mind, I suggest watching them to see if you can find where they nest. When you do, you should read about how to humanely kill the eggs, chicks, and parents, albeit only after being VERY SURE that you're looking at House Sparrows. Prolonged removal of the sparrows may help decrease their population in the area.

Bear in mind that your feeder is an artificial addition. It should never be a bird's main food source. The cardinal doesn't need your feeder to survive, it has food elsewhere. The concern in this case is that it's finding food in places you can't see, depriving you of the enjoyment of watching it. You might try a birdbath instead; the sparrows might be less defensive of it. You could also try putting up another feeder.

 

[KC Foggin]

My Cardinals love safflower seeds and the sparrows don't seem to care for it.

Another thing you can try is taking down the feeders for about a week and hopefully the Sparrows will move on. Good luck and please let us know if things get better for the Cardinals.

 

[etudiant]

My Cardinals love safflower seeds and the sparrows don't seem to care for it.

Another thing you can try is taking down the feeders for about a week and hopefully the Sparrows will move on. Good luck and please let us know if things get better for the Cardinals.

Agree that safflower seed works well, although it takes some priming (mix in some sunflower hearts) to get the cardinals hooked on it.
Mourning Doves are also fond of safflowers and will happily settle on the seed tray for an extended dining interval.

 

[Ted Y.]

House Sparrows are also an invasive species, at least in Canada.

Just in case, I identified a business authorized to do this kind of activity.

 

[Ted Y.]

Another thing you can try is taking down the feeders for about a week and hopefully the Sparrows will move on.

The sparrows are gone. Not far, to my neighbor feeders.

But we have a 4 meters fence (a natural one) and no direct visibility.

Waiting for cardinal(s) with safflower.

 

[Ted Y.]

Update:
Two cardinals males and two cardinals females are visiting the garden now.
The sparrows are back.
I begin to understand more about invasive species.

 

[Deans Sanctuary]

Platform feeders with small rails work best...I make my own and attach them to galvanized pipe inserted inside gray schedule 40 electrical conduit pounded into the ground. These are easily moved around quickly. Under a canopy of a large tree separated from other feeders. For the Cardinals use Gray Striped Sunflower seed only as like most birds the favorite is safflower but the goal is to find ways to keep the dominate species off of the feeder with a seed that a cardinal will eat. Not their favorite but they'll feed from that with the gray striped.

The other option is the scorched earth solution. Shut down everything for 10 days to 2 weeks.

 

[Prettybird88]

I witnessed some bellicose behavior.

A cardinal discovers spilled seed under a bird feeder and begin feeding on it.
The feeder is used by a “group” of house sparrows. At once, the chirping begins. Very, very noisy. The cardinal goes away. Silence. The cardinal come back. Chirping, again. The cardinal goes away again. The sparrows descend on the ground and eat the spilled seed.

This is denial of food resources.

It is an ecosystem without cats, squirrels, and the sparrows are the dominant species in the backyard and growing in number.

I want to attract cardinals in my backyard, and here are the questions:

How can I attract cardinals?

How can I temperate/avert this aggressive behavior of sparrows? Other that removing the feeder.

This is exactly the same problem I am having now. Have you figured out a way to get rid of the sparrows for good and attract cardinals instead? The sparrows are bad here - they were evidenced throwing out all the safflower seed on the ground as if they were digging” for their preferred food source. This was in a large platform tube feeder. Previously, they had a large platform feeder with cheap mixed seed in it - I quickly learned of their bully behavior when I saw it happen and found two dead birds by my tree! So I changed to safflower seed and when that didn’t work I changed the feeder too but it’s still a problematic situation.

 

[Deans Sanctuary]

Easy but it will take time.

1. Scorched earth...stop all feeding, when the Sparrows no longer come wait a additional week then return feeding.

2. And feed using Grey Striped Sunflower seeds only and when the Cardinals return after a couple of weeks add additional types of seed...as in Black oil and Safflower.

 

[Ted Y.]

Have you figured out a way to get rid of the sparrows for good and attract cardinals instead?

3 steps:

1. Scorched earth...stop all feeding, when the Sparrows no longer come wait a additional week then return feeding.

2. And feed using Grey Striped Sunflower seeds only and when the Cardinals return after a couple of weeks add additional types of seed...as in Black oil and Safflower.

3. Repeat when sparrow spies discover again the food source.

 

[PYRTLE]

3 steps:


3. Repeat when sparrow spies discover again the food source.

In the most genteel of ways, you're wasting your time. That's why such species are successful, they have an inbuilt desire to dominate, breed and repeat.
Yet they are declining in many parts of the UK, intensive farming, spraying harsh insecticides. Nestboxes and food is readily supplied but our village numbers have declined from around 50 to single figures. And three breeding pairs were successful though low brood n7mbers.

 

[Ted Y.]

In the most genteel of ways, you're wasting your time. That's why such species are successful, they have an inbuilt desire to dominate, breed and repeat

I do not want to win, just to have a long truce.

 

[PYRTLE]

I'm just a simpleton but wanting to avert the genetic behaviour as well as investigating an " invasive removal business " does slightly suggest you wish them gone for good. Good luck anyhow whatever works for you.

 

[etudiant]

I'm just a simpleton but wanting to avert the genetic behaviour as well as investigating an " invasive removal business " does slightly suggest you wish them gone for good. Good luck anyhow whatever works for you.

Just back from New Zealand, where removal of invasives countrywide is a 2050 national goal.
Seen that invasives have extirpated about half of NZs endemics, with many of the survivors hanging on by a thread, that goal has strong public support.
Unfortunately, there is no plausible way currently to achieve it. Existing methods work on isolated patches, oceanic islands typically, where mass poisoning can kill the mice and rats, leaving the cats and stoats to starve. For larger thousand square miles and up areas. they fail. Hence the battle is slowly being lost, despite great effort.
To illustrate, Ulva Island, a small island part of the Stewart Island complex, was made rat free by heroic effort in the early 1990s. Native birds flourished for a while. Then the rats returned, crossing stretches of water at low tide, so another rat extermination campaign was completed this year.
Among the victims were the native Weka, a flightless rail that forages on the ground, collateral damage from the rat killing campaign.
Interestingly enough, NZ has now learned to monitor the distribution of invasives by using bait stations that do not trap the animal, but merely record their passage with ink pads. Being able to monitor the situation and see when invasives are present is a huge step forward in understanding, even though it does not really solve the problem.