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My starlings curse

DamhahDamhah Posts: 43
edited June 2018 in Wildlife gardening
Hi,

So I have a feeding station with 
2 peanut feeders
1 Sunflower hearts feeder
1 suet block

I had about  10 starlings always making loud noise and fighting over the suet block. Had a couple of parakeets and some tits as well on the sunflower hearts and peanuts.

I removed the suet block as the starlings were causing havoc, but as soon as the starlings stopped coming, the rest of the birds also stopped. So I was forced to put the suet block back. It's like they are part of a union.

Also, anyone know why some if yheof the tits keep in dropping the sunflower hearts

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Posts

  • pbffpbff Posts: 433
    Starlings are a Red Listed Species and protected under The Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, so we're lucky to have them really, even though they can be a bit greedy.
    I absolutely love them!
    🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 0
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  • Mary370Mary370 Limerick, Ireland Posts: 1,845
    I love how cheeky the starlings are.  Although they do cover one of the garden chairs in poop as they sit on it.  They are definitely not a bad as the pair of magpies we had 2 years ago, they used to taunt the dog and cats and would squawk outside my bedroom window, dreadful racket.
  • DamhahDamhah Posts: 43
    Aha, I did not know that, will do what I can do to make them feel welcome
  • FireFire LondonPosts: 7,190
    Starlings are on the UK red list. Numbers are crashing across Europe.
  • Guernsey Donkey2Guernsey Donkey2 Posts: 6,684
    We used to have flocks of starlings, and often they would tap on the kitchen window, then gobble up the bird table food (in the days before we had containers for every different style of seed), however they hadn't been to our garden for years  until this Spring and we are delighted to have them back again.  They are feeding their young and making a real racket of a noise, so good to hear after such a long absence.
  • B3B3 Posts: 15,073
    I think you'll find the parakeets will be the real pest if their numbers increase in your garden.
    In London. Keen but lazy.
  • philippasmith2philippasmith2 Posts: 9,410
    Anyone who has seen the magic display that Starlings put on every evening for us mere humans will put up with the constant squabbling in the garden at this time of year.
    At least I hope so  :)
  • Hostafan1Hostafan1 Posts: 26,165
    We have vast murmurations of them in Winter  but they go away in the Spring
    Devon.
  • The Bald GardenerThe Bald Gardener South West ScotlandPosts: 212
    I had one starling at my feeders in the winter that was quite content to share (within reason) with my ASBO sparrows and various tits. Yet as soon as there were a few of them it reverted to being a bit of a thug like the rest of them.

    I often wondered if this was normal behaviour (i.e, on their own quite happy to share, utter thugs when mob handed) or, if one of them was actually quite laid back when alone and only 'showed off' when its mates were around.

    Nice enough birds, but there's only room for one noisy pest in my garden, me!  :D 
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