Food is the chief problem of winter birds. Cold alone is scarcely a menace, while snow and sleet are chiefly harmful only when they cover up the food. Given proper food, the only real requirement for a feeding station from the birds’ point of view is that it shall keep the food available, as by providing a roof to shed snow and ice. Among the wide variety of birds which frequently patronize food stations, various members of the sparrow and finch family, which includes the grosbeaks, juncos, and crossbills, vie with nuthatches, chickadees, woodpeckers, and blue jays as the most dependable boarders.

For winter birds in the northern states, it is well to have the station in place and stocked with food as early as the first of November. These birds are then beginning to establish hunting grounds and routes, from which they will not stray all winter. Earlier in the fall, as again in spring, ground feeding is the better method. In this, scatter the food (millet, hemp seed, and so on) in the back yard, along the fence line or at the edge of shrubbery or thicket. Juncos, Towhees, Song, Fox, and Tree Sparrows, and many others will benefit. Eagerly devoured by the waxwings are dried currants and dried raisins. Nearly all birds are fond of suet. Tie sizable chunks of suet to trees and to posts of food stations; this appeals especially to woodpeckers, nuthatches, and chickadees. Other standard foods are millet, hemp seed, sunflower seed, cracked corn, and bread crumbs. In addition, chaff and oats may be scattered on the ground for quail, grouse, pheasants, Horned Larks, Snow Buntings, longspurs, and others in localities wild enough for these birds. Such feeding is particularly desirable when the snow is covered by an icy crust. The food may be scattered under brush shelters, made of branchy tree limbs loosely and irregularly stacked and roughly thatched with pine, fir, spruce, or other conifer to keep out excess snow.

The care of a food station consists mostly in keeping up a supply of the proper foods and cleaning out the food trays as often as the condition suggests. A small separate tray of coarse sand will provide the grit many birds require. A hopper arrangement for feeding grains aids in keeping the food supply clean and it helps prevent the scattering of seeds.