When choosing the best bird food to put on your bird table, there are quite a few options, so it can be slightly overwhelming to pick one, especially if you are new to feeding birds.

What’s best to feed wild birds on a bird table?

You can choose to either feed your birds with seed mixes or seed straights. If you only have one feeding table in your garden, we recommend choosing a bird seed mixture, as this gives you more opportunity to attract a wide range of birds.

You can opt to go for a year-round mixture that isn’t season-specific, and that will attract birds and fill them with the right nutrients all year round. You could try our Four-Season Feast or Everyday Essentials; both seed mixes are packed with beneficial ingredients to keep your flying guests chirping all year round. Try out the Bird Booster seed mix to ensure that your birds are full to the brim of goodness for months of foraging and flying. Or, if you would like to bring a range of songbirds to your garden, our Songbird Sensation will do just that.

For a more season-specific feed, try our Winter Wellness in the winter months or our Summer Glow in the summer months. Each mix has been carefully created to ensure that the birds get the right amount of each ingredient to help see them through the challenges of those particular seasons.

You can use straight seeds to attract a specific bird type to your garden. For example, you can try leaving out some niger seeds, and you should hopefully see finches, sparrows or other small, sharper-billed birds flocking to your feeding table.

Get more from your bird table

To make sure that you are getting the most out of your bird feeding table, you should follow these simple tips;

• Make hygiene a priority!

As with any bird-feeding product, keeping it clean and hygienic is one of the most important things you need to do. Maintaining a clean feeder will not only ensure that the birds are fed safely, but it will also help you to maintain the range of birds visiting. We recommend cleaning your bird table at least once a week to avoid any build-up of old food, dirt or debris from collecting on the surface.

• Get the balance right

When putting food on a bird feeding table, it can be hard to know how much you need to put out at the start, but finding a balance between too much and not enough is important. We recommend starting with a few small handfuls of food and trying to keep an eye on the food over the next few days to see how much the birds take. Keep an eye on the food levels, and soon you will realise how much you need to leave out to keep your foraging friends full of treats!

• Keep your table sheltered and protected

There is a huge variety of bird tables to choose from; some will come with covers and some without. Our Bird Platform comes without a cover, so you will need to carefully consider where to place that in your garden to ensure that the food is protected and out of the way from any potential winds. Choose a spot in your garden out of direct sunlight, sheltered from harsh winds and partially covered from rainfall. Doing this will help to protect the food on your bird table, and it will keep it from blowing away and ending up all over your lawn!

Now that you know what food to fill your bird table with, you can read our blog and discover our tips on choosing the best bird feeder.