Two bloggers have taken the time and effort to share with us their tips regarding suet. This information is very helpful. With a dizzying variety of suets available to us, it is great to know what works and what doesn’t.
Joan wrote to say that she makes her own suet. Her suet recipe consists of lard and a mixture of sunflower and millet seeds. She went on to say that her birds prefer it to commercial woodpecker blocks. She also added that since her suet melts when daily temperatures begin rising at the end of winter, she stops feeding it to her birds in early spring.
Brooks commented that he stopped stocking his suet feeders with peanut butter suet because hungry squirrels like it too much. In an effort to remedy this problem, he now stocks his feeders with suet laced with hot pepper flakes. The suet containing hot pepper flakes doesn’t seem to bother the birds, but the squirrels don’t like it.
If you have found a suet that either works great or doesn’t work at all, let me know about it.
Terry, we use a mixture of peanut butter and “quick” oats and place in small scrub oak limbs with drilled holes. This is a favorite with woodpeckers; downys,red bellies, and red heads. Also, bluebirds,titmice,chickadees and pine warblers. We also use commercial peanut butter suet which as you have noted is the handsdown favorite of birds. We occasionally have seen sapsuckers feed on suet in the wintertime. Bob and Martha Sargeant furnished us a recipe for suet many, many years when they banded a black-chinned hummer. Our bird population has slightly improved lately. We now have two different hummers.
Nudicale,
Thanks for the great information. I had never heard of your quick oats recipe. Wow! A lot of different species use it when fed on the holes in tree limbs. I am familiar with the Bob and Martha Sargent recipe as they gave it to me when they trained me to band hummingbirds.
Terry