How to feed Cardinals
Cardinals can be quite reliable at bird feeders and thus, this will be the way to attract them, herein on you can feed Cardinals on the ground or on high surfaces.
How to feed Cardinals in your yard would mostly rely on a seed-filled hopper or seed feeder, or a dried/live-filled mealworm dish. All bird feeders must utilize a long perch or a tray as a place to perch. Suet feeders must be stabilized, whereas more success comes when feed is put on top of a platform feeder.
How you feed Cardinals will mostly be with use of a Hopper bird feeder, or a ground, wall mounted, hanging or pole mounted platform feeder.
Benefits with these platform feeders is that they're accessible to all size birds, like with Cardinals who find it hard to feed on too confined suspended seed feeder.
Cardinals don't demand special feeders yet will require accessible bird feeders that are suitable to their limited ability at feeders.
What you must remember when it comes to feeding Northern Cardinals on feeders, is that they will only come to bird feeders that meets their limited ability.
Patterns will emerge what feeders Cardinals use, including a Hopper, any open platform bird feeder - and suspended bird feeders with a featured spill tray. How all three types of bird feeders benefit Cardinals in particular - is that Cardinals have accessible footing to perch, which this larger bird will appreciate hugely.
Open top platform bird feeders will provide space to put a mix of seeds on, including nuts, fruits, plus dried and live mealworms in a pile all together.
In doing so, you could bare witness to Cardinals feeding their young, or indeed watch how an adult male Northern Cardinals would feed an adult female Cardinal.
In time you could also invite a Cardinal to feed on seeds or mealworms, directly out of the palm of your hand.
Heck, Cardinals could very well be attracted to a window bird feeder, for the simple reason it is usually an open dish which is filled with wild bird seeds.
So you see it isn't all that difficult to attract while birds to feeders, you just need to focus on what to feed Cardinals that is similar to their diet in the wild.
What Cardinals eat out of bird feeders will be most seeds provided in a hopper or hanging smaller seed feeder, along with nuts, berries and mealworms.
Fed on seeds in open platform
Not actually how to feed Cardinals but what to feed Cardinals on, can be a number of open or highly accessible bird feeders many people utilize already.
When feeding Northern Cardinals you will do so with a mix of bird seeds and possibly nuts, dried or live mealworms and fruits, yet that is optional for sure.
None of this really goes in a suspended small confined bird feeder unless its seeds, or sunflower seeds in particular, which are a Cardinals favorite food in the feeder.
Seeds of all kinds, including inferior millet which are cheap seed mixes, safflower seeds, some thistle seeds and the sunflower seeds of course, will better served in a hanging Hopper bird feeder, as oppose to on an open to all solid platform.
Open to all bird feeder platforms that are designed to be on the ground - which is a great way to feed ground feeding birds like Cardinals - and what can mounted or a hanging platform feeder, or indeed a pole mounted bird feeder, mustn't be rejected completely.
Benefits to open platform bird feeders or dish/trays positioned around the yard will allow a less able Cardinal to perch on a wide open platform, as oppose to a too confined suspended seed feeder.
Mealworms in ground feeder
What else you'll find you will be feeding Northern Cardinals on, is either dried or live mealworms, with the former being more readily used - which are offered out of hanging bird feeders, and put on a ground or pole mounted platform feeder.
Your Cardinals are ground feeding birds and will always be ground feeding birds by nature, thus to throw some dried/live mealworms on the part of the lawn where they frequent the most - will guarantee mealworms are found and eaten in good time.
Dried mealworms are made available for insect-eating birds like Cardinals, and therefore can be fed to them in a dish/tray or on top of a platform.
When throwing mealworms down on the ground, do so when wild birds are found to be in your yard regularly, or else they will be eaten by Blackbirds or Bluebirds.
Feed Cardinals in a well lit up area rather than a shaded area where wild birds tend to avoid overall.
Rather than feed Cardinals directly on the lawn, mud or patio, you can put a mix of dried or live mealworms on a slightly elevated ground bird feeder - which can in time be moved elsewhere if you feel it will be used more.
Classic seed feeder with wide perches
You know what, you may still be able to utilize your regular seed bird feeders of any kind, providing it provides plenty of room to perch as Cardinals feed.
Seed feeders full of their favorite sunflower seeds or inferior seed mixes, must be built with either super long perches, or what can be a seed spill tray - that will be used by larger birds like Cardinals as a place to perch as they eat.
Regular suspended seed feeders do often come in a size too small, yet these same feeders could utilize longer perches or use spill trays.
If that is what you have, then it may be accessible to Cardinals - if your seed feeders feel too small and compact - then upgrade to seed feeders that have better positioned, longer and wide open places for Cardinals to perch on.
Cardinals don't have to be fed out of any suspended confined seed feeder, when there's the option to put seed mixes in a dish or on top of a platform feeder.
Squirrels and other unwanted pests will find seeds on the ground or in an accessible platform feeder, thus you'd only want to put seeds intended for Cardinals in feeders high off the ground - in an effort to deter bird feeder pests like squirrels.
Suet in none-hanging feeders
When we provide our wild birds suet cakes or fat balls, we often do so in a compatible suet cake feeder, or a classic long fat ball feeder.
Let me say though to be perfectly clear, a pole mounted suet cake feeder will be accessible to Cardinals, whilst a suspended small compact suet cake cage will not be.
Similarly, a classic fat ball bird feeder hung up on a branch or pole won't be accessible to Cardinals who have little agility; yet if this same fat ball feeder utilizes a wide tray attached to its base - then of course Cardinals can perch here to feed on suet balls.
Cardinals are big suet cake and fat ball eaters - including suet pellets on platforms or in dishes - and therefore you'd want to keep it accessible.
Ideally you would want to feed Cardinals on fruits, insects or seed infused suet, yet nut or other types of suet in all its forms will do the trick.
How you provide suet to Cardinals in a suet cake form would ideally see the cage mounted to, or tied on to a pole or branch.
You don't want to suspend what is a too small suet cake feeder, as its simply too unstable for a less able Cardinals to perch on. Stabilized suet cake feeders will instead force Cardinals to feed on the suet while always perched on top of the feeder.
Worst comes to worse, put suet balls, cakes or pellets in a dish or on top of a platform bird feeder, because this way at least Cardinals can eat the suet before it expires.
When your yard space is enough
In the end, you just may need to throw down Cardinals favorite bird feed on the front or back yard, with no bird feeders or equipment needed.
Cardinals are one of the top backyard birds in the United States, thus most of us can experience the joys of Cardinals with little effort on your part.
Providing an attractive and inviting backyard landscape can be enough, with a wide open yard, plenty of places to perch, and a lawn for Cardinals to forage in - which is enough to keep them coming back for more.
An accessible seed or mealworm-filled bird feeder or dish will be enough to attract Cardinals to your yard, yet to keep it simple by placing bird feed placed high on elevated surfaces, will be enough for now.
Similarly, an attractive, well landscaped bird-friendly backyard would attract Cardinals to your feeders.
Cardinals like to hop around on the ground, in bushes or flutter around high in trees. To provide this kind of environment, together with a sunlit lawn or area with natural foliage, can be appealing to Cardinals and many other common backyard birds.
To summarize up
What is so great about feeding Cardinals in the yard, is this common backyard bird can happily feed out of bird feeders and on the ground - and also when bird feed is provided in dishes or left out on elevated surfaces around the yard.
What I'm saying is, it isn't too difficult to feed Northern Cardinals if they're already present in your yard, or the neighborhood at least.
How you would begin feeding Cardinals is along with everyone else on bird feeders.
Now, Cardinals aren't all that small nor do they have the agility to tackle small compact bird feeders, like more agile Finches or Warblers do.
With that, any seed-filled feeder especially must feature a longer perch or have a spill tray mounted to the bottom, as a place where Cardinals can perch as they feed.
How to feed Cardinals will of course have you and me prioritize bird feed that is a substitute for what they eat close too in the wild.
You can feed Cardinals on a mix of readily available wild bird seed mixes, while baring in mind sunflower seeds are a favorite.
Cardinals also like to eat dried or live mealworms, of which can't go in a small confined, enclosed bird feeder. You will need to put mealworms on top of an open platform bird feeder, which are accessible to all wild birds.
Suet isn't something Cardinals eat in the wild yet is readily eaten in our yards, when suet is available in accessible suet feeders or when suet it put in a dish or on the platform feeder, Cardinals will be found to eat it.
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