What to Feed Garden Birds in Winter (and What to Avoid)

A blue tit weighs about 11 grams and can lose a tenth of its body weight on a single cold night. In winter, when natural food is scarce and the nights are long, what you put out in the garden genuinely matters.

Lead with fat

Cold birds need calories, and fat is the densest form available. Everything in the suet range is built around that:

• Fat balls — the classic. Starlings, sparrows and tits will empty a feeder fast. If they come wrapped in green nylon netting, remove it first: birds get their feet and tongues caught in it.
• Suet blocks — slower to go, which suits woodpeckers and nuthatches.
• Suet pellets — the most flexible. They work on a bird table, in a dish or scattered, so robins, wrens and dunnocks get a share.
• Suet-filled coconut halves — hang up as they are, no feeder needed.

Peanuts are the other high-fat option and come into their own between autumn and early spring.

Timing matters more than people think

Two feeds a day beats one big one. Birds come out of a long night with almost nothing left, so early morning food is the most valuable of the day. A mid-afternoon top-up lets them go into the night with reserves.

Put out what will be eaten in a day. Food left sitting in wet weather goes mouldy, and mouldy food makes birds ill.

Water is the thing everyone forgets

Birds need water to drink and to keep their feathers in condition, and in a hard frost every natural source freezes. A shallow dish of water, broken open each morning, can be worth as much as the food. Never add salt or antifreeze — both are poisonous to birds.

What not to put out

• Milk. Birds cannot digest lactose. It makes them seriously ill.
• Lots of bread. A little is not poison, but it fills birds up without giving them much, and in winter a full stomach of nothing is a real problem.
• Salted or dry-roasted nuts. Birds cannot process salt. Plain peanuts only.
• Cooking fat from the roasting tin. It mixes with meat juices, stays soft, smears on feathers and goes rancid. Solid suet products are formulated for the job; leftover fat is not.
• Desiccated coconut. It swells once eaten. Suet-filled coconut halves are fine — the dried, shredded kind is not.
• Mouldy anything. Some moulds that grow on old food cause respiratory infections.

Keep the feeders clean

Winter concentrates a lot of birds onto a few feeding points, which is exactly how disease spreads. Trichomonosis has caused serious declines in UK greenfinch numbers, and dirty feeders are part of the story. Scrub feeders out every week or two, let them dry properly, and move them around the garden now and then so droppings do not build up in one spot.

A sensible winter setup

If you are starting from nothing, this covers most of it:

1. A seed feeder with sunflower hearts.
2. Something suet — fat balls or a suet block in a cage feeder.
3. A tray or a patch of ground with mixed seed for blackbirds and dunnocks.
4. A shallow dish of water, kept ice-free.

Feeders start at £5.99, and every food comes in a small bag if you would rather try before committing to 12kg.