BirdFeederWise.com is an independent editorial site about backyard bird feeding. It is written for people with a feeder on a pole or a hook outside the kitchen window: the household comparing camera feeders before the holidays, the neighbor who has lost the squirrel war three times, the person who wants cardinals rather than grackles, and anyone whose hummingbird feeder keeps filling up with ants. Not researchers or licensed rehabilitators, but backyard feeders with a yard, a window and a bag of seed.
We start with the situation rather than the product. Which birds are already in your area, how close the feeder sits to a jumping off point, whether the window behind it is a collision risk, how cold it gets before a bath freezes over. Once that is clear, the gear question usually answers itself, and quite often the honest answer is that moving a pole or changing the seed beats buying anything.
We are an editorial team, not a wildlife agency
We are writers and researchers who follow this hobby closely, not ornithologists, wildlife biologists or veterinarians. Nothing here is a diagnosis, a rehabilitation plan or a substitute for the guidance of the people who study these birds. We describe what a feeder is designed to do and what feeders commonly run into, and we never claim that a product keeps birds healthy.
What a species should eat, how nectar is mixed, how often a feeder needs cleaning and what to do when sick birds show up all come from Cornell Lab of Ornithology and All About Birds, from Audubon, or from a university extension service, and we name the source. During a disease outbreak, and for any local rule about feeding, your state wildlife agency is the right first call.
How we work
We do not run a test yard and we do not physically test the feeders we write about, and we do not pretend otherwise. Our guides are built on published manufacturer specifications, on official guidance where it exists, and on what backyard feeders consistently report after a season or two of real use. Figures such as a seed capacity, a camera resolution, a battery rating or a nest box hole size are repeated only as the maker or an official source states them, never invented or assumed.
We favor gear that suits the birds actually visiting you, because the feeder that works for goldfinches is rarely the one that works for woodpeckers. Camera feeders get an extra layer of scrutiny, since some of them carry a subscription and some of the brands sell mainly through their own store rather than a retailer, and we say which is which. We also keep prices out of the written guides, since they change constantly and the current one is always on the retailer page. Whether feeding is allowed or temporarily discouraged where you live varies by state and by town, so we explain the general picture and point to your state wildlife agency rather than telling you what your address allows.
Questions, corrections and topic suggestions are welcome at contact@birdfeederwise.com.