How does a bird feeder work

What better way to feed birds in your backyard then in a secure but tidy manner, while restricting certain nuisance birds or keeping pests well off wild bird food.

How a bird feeder work is with a contraption designed to store away all types of bird food, while slowly drip feeding it to birds when they come to the feeder. Depending on the bird food in use, the corresponding bird feeder will either have ports with a perch for birds to poke their beaks in, or use a cage with gaps.

Feeders designed to be used for wild birds is simply a device in various styles made to store wild bird food, but only in a way where birds can feed off it.

It can depend on the bird species capabilities, with certain species only able to access more open to the element bird feeders - while seasoned bird feeder birds can use a bird feeder with their eyes shut.

Feeders can only be species specific, meaning seed or nut feeders will attract seed-eating birds, whereas a suet cage feeder can attract the same birds, and many more.

Bird feeder types vary, with seed feeders designed as a clear plastic tube, where seeds are slowly filtered through port wells until they run out. Hopper style bird feeders function the same way, only they are made more accessible.

Hummingbird feeders work the same way, only its design to hold liquid in homemade nectar - with use of sugar and water only.

Cage or mesh feeders can hold anything from nuts, suet to dried mealworms, all of which are developed to allow birds to cling onto, while poking their beaks through the gaps at any angle.

And there you have it, how a bird feeder works - depending on what its made for - will store away bird food, while only allowing birds to take what they need. While at the same time it can prevent larger, more nuisance birds accessing the bird food in the feeders.

Slowly drop fed bird food

The idea behind any type of wild bird feeder is to slowly drop feed bird food to wild birds, yet at the same time to keep the bird food stored away to protect it from the weather.

Exposed bird food will decay far sooner than any feed shut in behind a bird feeder, thus bird food must be kept stored as long as it can.

Depending on the type of bird feeder in use, how bird food is released can drip down or be fetched via the sides... but never at the top.

Similarly, water can be offered to wild birds the same way, if water is suspended in a bottle.

Bird feed is fed to birds in closed containers that are designed to keep food in good condition for several days in cold conditions - whereas summer months can reduce bird feed expiry date to only a few days.

Bird food sitting on top of platform bird feeders, just as you would offer bird food on the ground or on an elevated object, decays sooner than this.

How bird feeders work is to store away bird food in a safe cage, clear plastic tube or behind a mesh container; with food dropping to the bottom to be within reach of birds where they perch - or birds can grab food via the openings in the sides.

Feeder built to species capability

No one size fits all in bird feeders as each one is designed to match the wild bird species feeding capabilities.

Excluding less able, non bird feeder birds, but few will still use a bird feeder just to give it a try, if there's food up for grabs then why not...

Of those, the American Robin, Blue Jays or Bluebirds would much rather feed off the ground, or in the open - rather than scale a too small hanging bird feeder.

Its therefore possible these birds, and many more would only feed off an open platform, be it one that is on a stand, hangs or is mounted to a wall.

Feeders that hold seeds are suited to birds that eat seeds in the wild, and those that can will prefer to feed off larger, panoramic style seed feeders - made with a wider tray fixed to the bottom, that also acts as a perch.

Nut bird-eaters are usually the same bird species that eat seeds, so their limited capabilities are similar to when scaling a seed feeder.

To store nuts in a bird feeder that has a full mesh surround, birds can cling onto this mesh cage to peck at nuts through the small gaps, while keeping the peanuts secured.

Insect-eating birds tend to be ground feeding birds only, thus an open tray would normally be used to hold dried or live mealworms - as birds that eat insects would otherwise struggle to use a closed up feeder.

Bird feeder type varies

How a bird feeder works can depend hugely on the type of bird food in use, while no bird feeder is the same how it releases food, or how it is designed.

• Seed feeder is a perspex tube feeder with seeds stored behind a clear window, seeds can be accessed via the port hole or at the bottom where bird seeds are released
• Nut feeder is a rounded, wreath or ball shape feeder that uses a steel mesh to keep the peanuts trapped behind it, while offering just enough space to allow nut-eating birds to poke their beaks through
• Suet feeders can be in the shape of a flat sandwich to hold suet cakes, long and rounded to hold fat balls, or a mesh-type feeder to store suet pellets - the former are designed with a plastic coated wire cage, with wide gaps
• Dried mealworm feeders can be similar to a seed feeder in a tube, or a nut feeder with fewer, but wider gaps - better still dried mealworm feeders in an open tray has little to no restrictions in place

• Hummingbird feeder is a clear plastic tube, filled with sugary-water that is held upside down in a bottle, whilst the vacuum held water is filtered through multiple port wells, where hummingbirds feed
• Platform feeder can by on a stand, hang, on the ground or be mounted; its designed mostly in wood but is open to the elements, with a roof platform bird feeder an option
• Hopper bird feeder is mostly designed to hold seeds behind two clear perspex windows on opposite sides, while birds perch on the tray at the bottom where bird seeds remain in the open on a tray... suet hold or nut feeder may be attached
• Window bird feeder is stuck to the glass window with use of suction cups; it can only be a more practical open tray, designed to hold fewer bird seeds, yet remains restricted to smaller bird species

Unobstructed access

Bird feeders won't be feeders is they are at all obstructed, well designed bird feeders will offer unrestricted access to your backyard birds as they feed.

Seed feeders can offer the most restrictions of all types, as a long, suspended seed bird feeder can only provide up to two port holes situated opposite sides of each other, whilst a short perch on the seed feeder is limited to smaller seed-eating bird species.

Solution to that is you would then use a large rounded seed feeder, with a 360° seed catching tray, surrounding the base.

Alternatively, it would be better to use what is known as a hopper bird feeder, which is designed to store more seeds, with greater accessibility.

Feeders made to hold nuts can be a small mesh cylinder with a mesh surround that is the most restricting; thus a wreath nut feeder can be used for less able birds to cling or land on top as they feed.

And then to hold dried or live mealworms, pick the open tray dish for all insect-eating birds to feed; or else place mealworms on top of what is a platform bird feeder, made to be open to the elements - and therefore open to all birds in the yard.

Feeders work to store away bird food to keep it in place while birds feed, while at the same time allow birds to feed off it when they want.

If no bird feeder is being used to feed backyard birds, larger birds or other yard pests can steel the bird food right away, thus an heavy, awkward bird feeder cannot be taken away.

Conclusion

What exactly is a bird feeder is a wild bird food contraption that is designed to store away up to four or more wild bird food groups, while the feed is slowly drop fed to birds.

Seeds are suspended in a clear window tube, and with the more seeds' birds eat the seed mixes continue to flow until empty.

Hopper style bird feeders tend to store seeds only, but in a way its more accessible than than the tube seed feeder types.

Nut feeders are different, in that the peanuts remains trapped behind a mesh steel netting, while allowing birds to cling onto the sides to feed through the open gaps.

Suet is the best type of bird feeder for birds to access, with a simple wide gap plastic coated wiring - creating a cage for birds to poke their beaks in.

Hummingbird feeders appear to be a complicated contraption, but in fact they simply drip feed nectar via accessible port wells, where hummers stick their long beaks through.

Bird feeders needn't be this complicated at all, because the fact is a bird feeder can be an open to the elements platform - designed to hold any bird food imaginable, and then some - made accessible to all bird species.

Similarly, a wild bird food dish can be hung on a tray or be mounted to a bird feeding station pole, to store all this and more, while the mesh base allows water to drain away.

Bird feeders do vary, but how a bird feeder works is to keep the bird food stored away, while allowing wild birds unobstructed access for what ever they need to feed on in complete safety.

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