Many people believe that breadcrumbs and a few grains of rice, corn or bird seed are enough to keep birds fed in winter. This is wrong. In winter birds need food with a high calorie content to fight against the cold.

When you put out food for birds in winter make sure you supplement it with nuts, bits of fat or bacon rind. You can make a sort of seed cake by mixing together the seeds, crusts of bread and other kinds of bird food and binding it with animal fat. These seed-cakes can be placed on a window sill or in the garden. If you want to watch the birds eat you must not let them see you or they may be too frightened to come. Some birds, however, become very tame with regular feeding and will come every day and wait at the usual feeding place. Robins in particular are friendly birds who will approach people readily.

IT is useful to sprinkle some sand around the food as it makes a more natural surrounding for the birds. Sand is also useful because birds usually swallow a few grains to help them digest harder seeds.