Throw a Party for Your Cardinals. We'll Bring the Confetti!
Whether your yard is covered with a beautiful blanket of snow or it's just a drab winter's day, a visit from a Northern Cardinal always brightens the mood. Offer our exclusive Cardinal Confetti™ Blend formulated to attract cardinals, Pyrrhuloxia, and a variety of other birds. It's loaded with high-fat seeds, Bark Butter® Bits, dried mealworms and peanuts. Shop now for foods and feeders from our Cardinal Collection and get the party started!
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Give Birds a Super Winter
Winter is a wonderful time to feed the birds. Not only is a chance to help birds get the necessary fats for surviving longer nights and colder temperatures, but it's also a good time to see a variety of birds visiting you're feeders. Our Winter SuperBlend® is a high-fat seed blend, specifically formulated to provide birds the essential energy and fats needed to survive whatever winter throws at them.
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Offer Water to Help Birds Survive Winter
Water is very important to birds for drinking and bathing - even in winter. Clean feathers help birds stay warm and having access to a bird bath can be critical during colder weather. Research has shown that a chickadee with well-maintained feathers can sustain a 70°F (21°C) layer of insulation between the outside air and its skin.
Plus, adding a dependable water source to your yard is one of the easiest ways to greatly increase the variety of birds in your yard. That means more joy for you!
During freezing weather, use a heated bird bath to ensure that birds have a reliable, open source of water.
We offer a variety of bird baths and bird bath accessories that will attract more birds to your yard, and help the birds survive winter. Shop now!
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Helping to Tame Winter for Your Birds
A high fat diet…the medical books say it’s just not good for us.
Well, it’s a good thing that birds can’t read! Because a diet high in fat is an absolute necessity for many of them to be able to survive the rigors of winter.
For birds, fat is fuel. It is the most concentrated energy source that a bird can consume and it is the only dietary component that is absorbed completely intact by their body. Stored body fat is the primary energy supply that fuels a bird throughout the winter.
Keeping warm is costly. A bird expends about 60% of its energy generating body heat. To stay warm, songbirds may use up 75-80% of their fat reserves during a single winter’s night. That’s equivalent to shedding, and then replacing 10% of their weight in the form of body fat, every twenty-four hours.
Even in areas lacking bitter temperatures, the most overlooked winter survival challenge for birds is having to endure the long period of darkness during the night. While roosting, a small songbird needs to sustain itself for 13-15 hours, solely by using its fat reserves for fuel.
For these birds, the daily challenge is to find enough food to not only make it through each day, but to also replace their fat reserves for the coming night -- all in the course of limited daylight hours.
So, this is where you come in.
Have you noticed how ravenously the birds eat at your bird feeders during the winter, especially first thing in the morning and just before dusk? Your birds are probably taking full advantage of the high-fat foods you are offering to quickly replenish their much needed fat reserves.
High fat foods are a critical necessity that you can provide your birds to help them survive the challenges of winter. By providing a reliable source of these foods, such as all types of suet, Winter SuperBlend® SuperSuet® and Bark Butter® products, you can truly make winter a little tamer for your backyard birds.
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Nature Happenings in January
• Now through late March is a difficult time for birds; providing food and an open source of water is important. Place a heated birdbath on your deck or close to your bird feeders.
• Watch for mixed flocks of birds to feed on winter berries, poison ivy and cedar trees. This is the reason Eastern Red Cedar is the first tree introduced on vacant pastureland. AND the same reason Poison Ivy pops up in your flower garden in the spring.
• Project FeederWatch continues, www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw
• Woodpeckers are easy to spot on leafless trees. In this area we have the following woodpeckers: Red-bellied, Hairy, Downy, Red-headed, Pileated, Northern Flicker and Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers.
• Barred Owls will begin their “Who cooks for you” hoots and begin mating by mid-January. Make sure nesting boxes are ready to use.
• During late January and early February, Great Horned Owls will be sitting on their eggs. Listen for their “hoots” as they are still paring up. No need for a nesting box as they use the nesting sites from other large birds even to the extent of stealing a Bald Eagles nest.
• Bald Eagles will begin rebuilding nests and by the end of February can be incubating eggs. Look for extremely large nests in the tops of mature trees.
• Look and listen for the Short-eared Owl. They are only here during the winter, leaving late winter for breeding in Canada. Best time to see the Short-eared owl is dawn and dusk, flying close to the ground “listening” for their prey.
• Late in the month, as days lengthen, Tufted Titmice and cardinals begin to sing. Cardinals flocking; they're usually the first and last birds to be seen at feeders. Set your feeders close to forest edge, bushes and trees for protection.
• Look for hawks such as Red-tailed, Cooper’s and Sharp-shinned in your backyard.
• Peak of Bald Eagle migration
• Waterfowl are present on deep-water lakes. Go to Lake Frederick and Abrams Creek Wetlands to observe many winter residents like Scaups, Gadwalls, Grebes and the Cackling Goose.
• Start planning your butterfly and bird gardens this month.
• Skunk Cabbage is the first flower of the year to bloom. Look for it in marshy, wetland areas towards the end of the month.
• Tired of squirrels? Unfortunately January is the first of two Squirrel mating seasons. On average they will produce 4 Pups per litter. However, if you love squirrels, time to put up a squirrel nesting box.
• White-tailed Deer bucks are beginning to shed their antlers.
• Earthworms burrow below the frost line and become dormant.