Feed the Birds!

Today is the official start of winter but we've already had a couple of little tastes.  It's pretty mild here in the Gulf Islands, however, we've had one spell of very cold weather and just recently, a bit of snow which is now melting.

There's not much happening in the garden, but our bird feeders are very busy.  We've had to put out a small hummingbird feeder for two Anna's Hummingbird females.  These hummingbirds don't migrate in winter, finding sustenance in small insects, tree sap provided by sapsuckers and the occasional brave flower.  We have a viburnum which starts flowering in November and doesn't stop until spring which must be of some help.  Still, the cold weather must take its toll on them so we help them out with sugar-water feeders.  Usually you make a hummingbird mixture 1 part sugar to 4 parts water but in the winter you can do that 1:3 for Anna's, which is how ours is set up.  Anna's look very similar to Rufous Hummingbirds.  The females are much the same coloration, but without the rusty tones of the
Rufous and they're slightly larger.  We've never seen a male, which has an iridescent red-coloured head.

Chestnut Backed Chickadees

We always have a feeder filled with black oil sunflower seeds for birds winter and summer.  We see lots of chickadees, juncos, nuthatches, towhees and purple finches in the winter.  At this time of the year we augment the feeder with a suet block.  The chickadees especially love the suet block as they're very adept at hanging upside down.  I make my own suet blocks following a recipe I found and adapted from the Internet.

Suet Blocks for Birds

1 part lard
1 part crunchy peanut butter
1 part flour
2 parts rolled oats
2 parts cornmeal
various seeds and dried fruits.

Melt the lard in a large pot.  Add the peanut butter and stir together.  Add remaining ingredients and pour into a baking pan.  Since I use a whole pound of lard, I pour the mixture into a 9x13 pan.  Allow the mixture to cool and slice into blocks.  The 9x13 pan makes 6 blocks.  Now put the pan in the freezer and leave overnight.  You can easily remove the blocks by running hot water over the bottom to just melt the outside edges of the blocks.  I place the blocks in large ziplock bags and freeze them until they're needed.

The blocks I made last week have niger seeds, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, currants and dried cranberries added.  I throw in whatever is on hand and since I have quite a bit of it, I used half old fashioned rolled oats and half steel-cut oats.  I've seen recipes with sugar added.  Why on earth would you add sugar?!  It sounds totally wrong.