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Hello Mark! I just tried out the Chain method and it's working!!! Long Island here!

Watching “Where did all the Goldfinches go?” in Twin Cities MN

Aming helpful info! I'm on Long Island and new at bird feeding . I have learned so much from you. Thank you so much!

Yes I have Grackles ! Ugh! That eye lights up!!!

don't nuts attract squirrels?

I guess I have been lucky because I have never had ants in my Hummer feeders. There is a little built in moat in my feeders, though. I use the Aspect brand Hummer feeders. As for bees, I never see any. I see tons of wasps, but I do not fill my fill my Hummer feeders to a high fill level, so wasps usually give up pretty quickly. I buy the black oil sunflower seed in the 25 lb bag. I buy the safflower in 5 lb. bag, and I buy thistle in 10 lb bag. I store all of my seed inside my home. So far, I have no had any problems with bugs. I have a large concrete bird bath in the. yard. I empty it every night. It think it could use a scrub. It is not bad at all, but it will get bad if I do not service it soon. I was going to use bleach and cover it so the birds cannot get into it. Does that sound okay? I will rinse well of course.

will suet dough and cylinder seed logs go rancid in the heat?

What is your advice about buying seed from a store that already has webs and dead or alive moths/worms in them?

The previous 3 years since we moved to Northwest Indiana our feeders had almost no traffic at this point in summer. It'd be two weeks before the feeders were emptied. This year I cannot keep up. I fill them at 6:15 in the morning and by lunchtime half of the seed or more is eaten. I've about gone through a 50 lb bag of sunflower seed in a week... in addition to the peanuts, safflower and other specialty seed. It's been crazy. And this was before the flocks of blackbirds started showing up yesterday. I wonder if the cicadas had something to do with this, causing a spike in breeding and offspring or something. I love seeing it, though it's getting costly! $$$$

Good video. More people that just decide to feed birds should go online and learn more about feeding birds. To many buy the wrong feeders. And just dont know that they need to check the condition of the feed in their feeders. Alway good information in your videos. Thankyou I just started using an aluminum pickup toolbox that i built a frame for, made into a bench, to keep my bird seed in.

Great information. Thank you.

What is name of the seed after the hot seed. Neutral. ?

Thank you for all the tips, Mark. I appreciate you.

Awesome bird, very unique call

Thanks for the information ❤

Thank you Mark as always your information is very useful. 🐦‍⬛🐦‍⬛

Thank you so much for this information

Do bird calls!

Thanks to your video, I just realised that the very cheery bird song I have heard so many times around my home but had no idea which bird it was has to be a House Wren! 🤗

I agree that buying quality seed is essential in every way. Many years ago in my salad days, I decided I wanted to feed the wild birds and purchased a huge bag of mixed seed at Walmart. None of the birds touched it. I felt like a total failure and never bought any more again. Then, years later, I stopped in at a local wild bird store, and I was telling this story to people working there. They told me that the seed I purchased was poor quality and had been stored in silos for 5-7 years. No wonder the birds did not want it! They knew it held no nutritional value. The seed I purchased at the local store was gobbled up. Lesson learnt. Now, I did find out that in an emergency, the birds will eat that awful old seed, but they have to be in dire straits. For example, the Winter of 2020 (and again in 2021) was one of the worst Winters we had in decades. I think a lot of wild birds perished that Winter. I heard about the storm that was coming, so I drove to the wild bird store to buy seed. I had not been there in a long time. To my chagrin, they had closed down, and there was no other store for at last 20-25 miles away. I had no way to get to one of the other stores, so I ordered BOS on Amazon. The freezing cold snow and ice hit, and I nervously awaited delivery of the seed, but FedEx lost the package. I ended up having to place another order, but by the time it arrived days later, the worst of the snow and ice was melting. It was then that someone at a wild bird store told me that in those sorts of circumstances, the birds are desperate. They are literally staving, so they would eat that awful seed from Walmart. I will always keep that in mind should we ever have that sort of record breaking cold again. I would buy the awful seed again in those sorts of circumstances, but only in those sorts of circumstances.

I sent you a question on instagram.

How come hawks don’t go after wrens blue jays or mocking birds?

I love your presentations. We have a momma Robin incubating her eggs in the tree next to our home in the country up near Mayerthorpe Alberta Canada. My first chance to watch a momma bird every day. I wish the best for her with the heat right now and having to stay up there for several days. We usually have lots of Blue Jays but not so many right at this moment. They must be in the woods right now with the heat and dry weather? We have woods to the side and back of us. Your information is very helpful.

Do birds have a thyroid gland?

Can birds get fat?

Here in Central Florida we have populations of a Carolina wren that stays all year round

I used to live in Seattle in a wooded area with lots of ravines and trees. We had all kinds or wildlife. But one of my favorite sightings was of what first seemes like a mouse messing about in the leaf litter. It was a tiny Pacific Wren, which didn't fly even when I got close. Later I heard its song, so beautiful for such a tiny creature.

I have a tube feeder, and my Finches love it!

I had a Jenny and Jake wren flittering about just a couple of days ago. I guess they were scoping out potential nesting spots. They eventually moved on.

Do House Wrens have more than one brood in a season? One of my wren houses has another round going.

For the Carolina Wrens, is it only the boy that sings? I have a pair that have become very sociable after i fed them thru the winter. But i've only seen the boy sing. The girl will chirp and peep in reply, but not much else. I've noticed the boy seems to run a patrol every morning where he perches up in the same locations and sings then moves to the next location. Always following the same route and stopping in the same locations. In the winter this little guy would perch up right next to my bedroom window and sing as loud as he possibly could till i brought him out some peanut suet. Both the girl and the boy stayed glued to the suet thru the winter. Besides the peanut suet, both would eat peanut chips. And the girl would eat some sunflower chips, but not the boy. In the summer, they couldn't care less about any of the food and instead prefer some appetizing bugs. But they still stop by every day to take a swim, grab a drink and generally hang around my back patio for a few hours before moving on. The seem to like their food and water on the ground. When i'd put it in a tree, they wouldn't eat it.

Thanks, Mark! I love wrens. The Bewick's, Canyon, Marsh, House, Pacific, and Rock Wrens are in my area during different parts of the year. I currently have two House Wren families in my yard.

What cute and beautiful sounding little birds! Thank you for sharing the pictures and sounds and info. Take care, God bless

The Blue birds and swallows have gone as they do here in the UP but boy are the wrens everywhere this year.

Seeing these in the summer (and last summer) here in the Fort Riley area. Very unique and beautiful raptor.

Thanks for in the information...several years back i found online plans for a sparrow spooker. My husband designed something similar. It is a wire shaped halo addition with shiny foil or mylar strips that dangle down onto the top of the box. This hangs over the top of the bluebird house and is added after eggs have been laid. I lost several bluebird nests to House Sparrows before but none in the several times we've put it up. But i also might try the less conspicuous fishing line instead. I was surprised the sparrow spooker wasn't one of your methods. Thanks for the great video.

LOL just now watching your channel. I must say I do not like jelly, and when given all kinds of jelly for gifts...sssshhhhh I feed to birds so they eat all flavors!

How long will the crop hold food?

Is the only function of the crop in a bird is to break up food or are there other functions?

Do hummingbirds have a crop?

Thanks for this! I've got suet out and black oil sunflower seeds but the latter is attracting rats. Do you have issues with rodents eating your mealworms as well?

Wonderful information! Thank you!!!!

Hello, what do you soak the feeders in before taking them apart before cleaning with dawn? And after they dry a bit and you spray on the 50/50 vinegar and water do you let the solution dry in the sun or shade? Thanks

Good video. I dont get mixes of seed. I have separate feeders for each kind of seed. Sunflower, safflower, niger, peanuts, all whole seed. But i do put a mixture of all that on the ground for the ground birds with few shelled peanuts. But this year the safflower seed that ive been able to get i dont believe is as good of qaulity ,it not all nice and white, more off color brown and gray in it. I dont believe the birds like it as well. House finches eating more of the sunflower seeds. Same with the chickadees. Then niger seed seems to be a shortage of it here in my area, cant find the ten lb bags i was getting last year, been buying niger socks already filled, but the gold finches dont seem to like it as well. In the past when gold finches come they stay on the same sock until every seed is gone and i just keep adding more socks the more birds i get and they stay all summer. This year i only have about ten percent of the volume of birds at my feeders. Each species represented, just not the numbers. One reason im sure is the huge change in the neighbors yard, cutting down all the bushes and adding dogs and more human activity. But also i dont think the quality of seed is good. I know there are lots of gold finches around, the ones that come to my house also go to some feeders half mile away that have sunflower pieces. But normally the niger seed is like addictive to them. Not this year. I do have a few more chickadees than normal. I do have a new bird coming to the feeder this year. Band tailed pigeon.

i cannot see the label on the high quality suet cake. Which brand/flavour is it? Thanks!

I have a question Mark. I am new at bird feeding and have learned a lot of things from you so thank you for that. But I have a problem. There are cardinals, finches and chickadees that try to get food from the feeders but unfortunately every feeder (five of them)are covered with British sparrows most of the time. It’s like “The British Are coming!! The British are coming!! Every feeding time. I’ve done a lot of research and it seems like the only solution is to do “ you know what” but not sure if I’d be doing the right thing. What are your thoughts? BTW I’m British. But I didn’t bring them here it wasn’t me!!

What brand did you say was the best one? Peanut Treat?? Is that by C&S?

I have heard you can make your own suet cakes at home. Is that true?? I have always been interested in feeding suet, but the reason I have never done so is I was afraid it would make a royal mess. I might try it this Winter in maybe January and February. March can be pretty cold here, too, but most of the year it is warm to hot here. Right now we are in triple digits with high humidity. Some Summers in July and August we have 115F, and with the heat index, it pushes us over 120F. (Wish I lived in Maine! I hate hot weather!) We often get temps in the 90s F even as late as November. I can recall a couple of Decembers in the last few years where I walked at the park in shorts and a t-shirt and felt warm. Every Autumn I wish for a cold, crisp Autumn and a really cold Winter. If it does not get really cold where you live, a lot of pests never die off. For instance, I used to keep show horses. I only had to tube worm them twice a year in Oklahoma, and I would paste worm them every three or so months in between. Moved to the Texas Gulf area, and whoa!!! I had to tube at least twice per year and paste every two months. Often ended up tubing 3X per year. Worming is really hard on the horses. After all, you are pumping poison into them, but it is a necessary evil because they can quickly die from worms. Vet said the difference in the two locations was it simply did not get cold enough down around the Gulf Coast area to kill off a lot of parasites. Thank heaven I no longer live in that area anymore.