Should you feed birds in your backyard?

Australian Community Media

Feeding native birds is a contested topic in Australia. An urban ecologist provides his advice for feeding birds safely and WIRES implores people to never feed wildlife.

Transcript

00:00between a third and a half of Australians anywhere in Australia are at any one time feeding birds.

00:07Should you feed birds in your backyard? It's a controversial topic in Australia,

00:13and most wildlife organisations or government agencies will advise you to never feed birds.

00:20Although it can be tempting to feed wildlife, particularly birds, it's usually best to avoid

00:26this practice. Some foods such as bread and mints can cause health impacts for birds and nutritional

00:33deficiencies. It also brings birds closer together and can potentially spread infectious diseases.

00:41Urban Ecologist Professor Darrell Jones changed his mind about bird feeding

00:46after he researched how common it is in Australia.

00:50I realised that people were not going to stop feeding birds, but in some cases they were

01:02inadvertently without even knowing, feeding them the wrong things. Professor Jones is clear that in

01:08Australia birds don't need to be fed, unless there's an extreme weather event like a bushfire.

01:14We're putting out food for us to enjoy the birds. The birds don't need it. If we stop feeding tomorrow,

01:22they would be fine. They'll just carry on doing what they've always done.

01:27When it comes to magpies, the most commonly fed bird in Australia, they don't eat seed. They eat worms

01:34and grubs, invertebrates primarily. Aussies often feed minced meat to magpies, which can be harmful.

01:42We really have to stop feeding any birds mints. It just doesn't have enough calcium. No bird

01:49just eats meat. No predator or carnivore just eats meat. They eat all the parts of the animal's body.

01:56And so until they come up with an artificial worm or invertebrate of some sort, the best thing to do

02:03is provide them with pet food. So just dry dog food or cat food is okay and it won't do them any harm.

02:10Professor Jones recommends purchasing bird feed manufactured by a reputable pet food company.

02:17It's really crucially important if we're going to feed birds to be very clean. It's like if you were

02:24inviting your friends over for dinner, you'd make sure the plates were clean before you actually

02:28provided the dinner. We sweep down any of the debris that was on there from the last,

02:32last time that we put some food out. I always wipe it down with some vinegar just to keep,

02:37kill anything that might be there. That's because bird feeders can spread diseases like beak and feather

02:43disease, which has high death rates and no effective treatment. It's quite prevalent in rainbow lorikeets

02:51and cockatoos and it's highly contagious and can be spread on surfaces. That's just one of the reasons

02:59WISE implores Australians to never feed birds. Although I know we all want to help our birds and wildlife,

03:06it does do generally more harm than good. If we do want to help, we can look into planting some native

03:13shrubs in our garden. Still on the fence about whether you should feed birds, both Professor Jones and WISE

03:22agree on one thing. Leaving water out for wildlife is a great idea. When you get the same reward,

03:28the birds will come and have a splash around and drink the food, drink the water right in front of

03:33you and it's a wonderful thing to experience. I would suggest using a very shallow dish and cleaning

03:39it regularly and also placing something like a stick or a rock into the water so any small animal that

03:44may fall into the water can climb back out again.

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