Bird Food Guide: Seed, Suet, Mealworms & Nectar

Best bird seed to buy

For most backyards in the eastern and central U.S., this short list covers nearly every feeder bird:

1. Black-oil sunflower: the best single seed. If you buy one bag, make it this. Check on Amazon
2. Sunflower hearts/chips: no mess under the feeder, and goldfinches love them. Costs more per pound but has no shell weight. Check on Amazon
3. Safflower: for cardinals, with less appeal to grackles, starlings and many squirrels. Check on Amazon
4. Nyjer: for goldfinches and siskins, served fresh in a nyjer feeder. Check on Amazon
5. White proso millet: in small amounts on a low tray for juncos, sparrows and doves. Check on Amazon

Mixes: choose blends where sunflower, sunflower chips, peanuts or safflower are the first ingredients. Skip bags that lead with milo, wheat, oats or red millet. Many birds kick those onto the ground. Widely sold brands include both good and filler-heavy blends, so read the ingredient list rather than the picture on the bag.

Suet

Suet is rendered beef fat, usually pressed into cakes with seeds, nuts, insects or fruit. It’s a high-energy food for woodpeckers, nuthatches, chickadees, titmice, wrens and creepers. In some areas, bluebirds and yellow-rumped warblers take it too.

• Offer it in a cage, tail-prop or upside-down suet feeder. Upside-down designs discourage starlings.
• In summer heat, use no-melt dough or skip suet. Soft fat can go rancid and smear on feathers.
• “Hot pepper” suet deters squirrels; birds are insensitive to capsaicin.

Mealworms

Mealworms are beetle larvae, sold live or dried. They are the best feeder food for bluebirds and are also eaten by wrens, robins, chickadees, titmice and nuthatches.

• Live mealworms are the most attractive. Keep them refrigerated in bran.
• Dried mealworms keep longer and are easier. Soaking them briefly in warm water helps.
• Use a smooth-sided dish so live worms can’t crawl out, and offer modest amounts rather than an all-day supply.

Nectar for hummingbirds and orioles

Mix 1 part plain white sugar to 4 parts water. Don’t add dye, honey, brown sugar or sweeteners. Change it every 1–2 days in hot weather. Orioles take the same mix from oriole feeders with larger ports. Full details are in the hummingbird feeder guide.

Fruit and jelly

Orange halves on a spike, and small amounts of grape jelly in a dish, attract orioles in spring. Catbirds, mockingbirds, tanagers and red-bellied woodpeckers may take them too. Serve jelly sparingly, in a shallow cup rather than a deep dish, and replace it often. Native fruiting shrubs are a better long-term source. See native plants.

What not to feed birds

• Bread, crackers and baked goods: filling but low in nutrition.
• Salted or seasoned nuts and seeds: use unsalted only.
• Moldy or damp seed: can make birds sick. Throw it out.
• Honey or dyed nectar for hummingbirds.
• Large amounts of cracked corn or milo in eastern yards. They attract house sparrows, blackbirds and rodents more than songbirds.

Feeding through the seasons

Storing bird seed

• Use a metal can with a tight lid in a cool, dry place such as a garage or shed. Mice and squirrels chew through plastic bins and bags.
• Buy what you’ll use in about a month, less for nyjer and sunflower chips, which go stale or rancid faster in warm weather.
• Keep it dry. Throw out seed that clumps, smells musty or shows mold. Moldy seed can make birds sick.
• Peanuts should be stored cool and dry and bought from a reputable source to limit aflatoxin risk.