Looking for a bird feeder for christmas (1 Viewer)

[Inquisitive buyer]

i find myself scrolling through amazon and find myself riddled with decision fatigue over all these bird feeders. so i've reached out to here for help deciding.


I want something that's

Not way to pricey like the 90 dollar squirrel solution 200.

gives birds ample room

ideally wouldn't exclude larger birds

large amount of bird feed so i wouldn't have to frequently refill it

ease of refilling and of general use


squirrel proof enough to where i'd get see the squirrels struggle comedically. i know there's no such thing as a 100 percent squirrel proof bird feeder but i still wouldn't want them getting the lions share. i also don't know how big of a problem they would be for bird feeders in my area even though i see plenty of them in my backyard.




i live in Houston texas, and i want to put it somewhere over here where it's visible from the sunroom. Advice and where i should put it is also welcome.

 

[Lisa W]

First off, welcome to the forum. There are three Wild Birds Unlimited in Houston, you might try going by there and getting their help, my local one helped when I started out. I don’t know if you know a lot about birds right now, if you do apologies. Different birds eat different foods; ex: Cardinals will eat black-oil sunflower seeds, Blue Jays eat peanuts, etc. A pole mounted feeder away from the trees will help cut down on squirrels, or you might attach an arm of some type to the fence and hang the feeder from it.
Hopefully someone else will chime in with more ideas.
Here is a pole from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Squirrel-She...-1-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9hdGY&psc=1

and a large feeder (remember if the seed gets wet it can go bad): https://www.amazon.com/Outdoors-Han...-3-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9hdGY&psc=1

 

[Kits]

Welcome to Birdforum.

Ideally, feeders should be close to shrubs, trees or bushes to give the birds some cover. Your space looks a bit too open.

 

[Inquisitive buyer]

Welcome to Birdforum.

Ideally, feeders should be close to shrubs, trees or bushes to give the birds some cover. Your space looks a bit too open.

so should i put it near the tree, or what ?

 

[Bossmanrocks]

Hi, years ago I was looking for much the same as you. I had a ton of birds to feed and didn't want to be filling them up on a daily basis. I got two of these from Walmart (have them about 10 years now) and at that time I paid $8 each for them. At least once a year I dissemble them and thoroughly clean them, hosing them out, which is relatively easy to do. Anyway, these are much more expensive now, but Petco has the best price (if you are in the states - though you can probably find them outside the US too) and you can use something like MSN shopping and Rakuten to get them discounted even more.

https://www.petco.com/shop/en/petcostore/product/more-birds-squirrel-x-squirrel-x2-resistant-bird-feeder

 

[Lisa W]

When I lived in AZ my feeders were out in the open. I would have an occasional hawk come by and the birds would scatter. Never saw evidence around the yard of a hawk catching a bird at the feeder.