Feeding birds is often thought of as a winter activity. Food is certainly a critical factor for birds in winter, but most bird feeding activity is more for the people who enjoy watching their feathered guests than it is for the birds themselves. Food is much easier for the birds to find in the warmer seasons, but they'll still respond to a well-stocked feeding station. A few of the winter regulars will still come, but a host of summer resident birds might join them.
The feeders in my back yard and at the conservation center are playing host to some very hungry Baltimore orioles that sometimes are waiting in line for a chance at some sugar water in their special feeder. A few of them will even crane their necks and hang on tightly to get a little sip of nectar from the hummingbird feeder a few feet away, if the oriole feeder is already occupied. A beautiful brick-red orchard oriole was in the area, too. Ruby-throated hummingbirds are back, and they're just as hungry for sugar water as the orioles.
Commercial mixes for both species are available, but plain old table sugar mixed at one part sugar to five parts water seems to be just as attractive. The dyes and flavorings sometimes added to commercial mixes are more to attract the buyers than the birds. One cautionary note, though. Summer feeders need frequent cleaning. Sugar water can "go bad" in only a few days of warm weather. Bugs are often attracted to the sugar as well, and a few always seem to crawl in and drown themselves in it. Dead critters in warm water is a perfect recipe for bacterial growth, and even without bugs, mold will begin to form after a few days. It will show up as cloudy, cottony masses or as black blobs. Specially shaped brushes are needed to reach into the narrow hidden areas of sugar water feeders. The little brushes may be available where the feeders are sold. A thorough cleaning at least once a week in warm soapy water is highly recommended.
Orioles lose much of their sweet tooth as they move into nesting and brood rearing, but a few may continue to visit right up until they migrate in early fall if they're nesting nearby. Hummers, too, will back off some during the summer, but their numbers will really increase later in summer as the young begin to feed and the birds fuel up for their fall migration.
Black oil seed sunflowers will still attract cardinals, finches and the occasional blue jay, but they might be joined by dazzling rose-breasted grosbeaks, if you're near a wooded area. Special goldfinch feeders offering niger (sometimes mistakenly called thistle seed) can attract large numbers of sparkling yellow gold-finches. A lucky few near wooded streams may be treated to deep blue indigo buntings at the same feeder. Seed mixes containing millet spread on a flat surface, can attract mourning doves and tame little chipping and song sparrows all summer long. Although the spring migration is nearly over, the same mixes can attract strikingly marked white-crowned, white-throated and fox sparrows, who may visit again in the fall. I put the small seed mix out a little at a time each day, so that it doesn't attract too large a following of house sparrows and common grackles (black birds)
Suet can get messy in warm weather, but summer dough cakes are available that don't melt and will continue to attract woodpeckers and a few other species. Keep in mind that wet food soon molds and cakes. Throw out wet food and replace with dry. Keep the seed feeders clean, too. Warm weather speeds the growth of problem molds that seldom bother in the winter. Brighten your yard and your days with a bird feeder and the colorful songsters it will attract.
(Steve Lekwa is director of Story County Conservation.)
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