Feeding birds

[shonam]

We've got a small garden - about 10x10m - and have always fed the birds. I'm now wondering if this will cause problems now that we're converting half the garden into a mini veg plot. Will they go raking through the beds and eat my crops rather than the seeds? I hope not as I love having the birds in the garden but also don't want all our hard work to go to waste.

[elvis2003]

just keep your more vulnerable crops netted...such as the brassica family (cauli,broc,sprouts etc) young peas and beans too. im testing a theory this year that the birdies wont touch red varieties,so am leaving somw red cabbage,red kale and red pak choi UNcovered,see what happens!
good luck with your new patch and carry on enjoying your feathered friends

[tricia]

The only problem I have ever had with the birds in my veggie garden was they seemed to like the red flowers on runner beans. I no longer grow runners - prefer french beans - and although I grow quite a variety of veg. I have no problem with the birds. I feed them all year with sunflower hearts, suet pellets, niger seed, dried meal worms and fat balls. I net the blueberries and the morello cherry tree because of the blackbirds but they've never bothered the raspberries so I don't bother netting them.

Tricia

[goodlife]

We feed birds all year round on our lottie..OH buys 25kg sack of feed every 6 weeks ..so the birds do get through some...
But for return I rarely suffer with greenfly or other insect problems..I can hardly remember when...as they all get eaten too
And the fun watching birds ..priceless!
Only down side is that netting is must with veg..then again berries, part from cherries are mostly left alone..it's like they attack the crops that I try to protect
As I grow too much berries for my use anyway, I don't mine to share..chickens are well supplied with red-,white- and black currants too..for some reason sparrows like anything red best

[shonam]

Good news for the birdies then.  And us too as we love to watch them. We had three magpies chuckling away and jumping about in the garden the other night which was so much more entertaining than anything on the telly lol. Would be a shame to lose that so I'm glad we can all co-exist. Thank you!