Steel Mesh Peanut Feeder

Peanuts bring in the birds a seed feeder misses. Woodpeckers, nuthatches, chickadees and jays all work a peanut feeder hard, and most of them barely glance at a tube of small seed. If your feeder has settled into the same four regulars, this is the thing that changes the cast.

It is a steel mesh cylinder with a moulded green lid and base. Birds land on it and cling to the side, which is worth watching on its own. Nuthatches come down it head first.

What you get

• Steel mesh body with a green ABS lid and base
• One perch bar through the base, out both sides, for birds that would rather stand than cling
• Lift off lid with a knob, so filling it is one hand
• Wire carrying handle, hangs from a hook or a branch
• 29cm tall, 35cm including the handle, 6.5cm across, 14cm across the perch

Why mesh and not a tray

Birds cannot pull a whole peanut through the mesh. They have to work pieces off it, which matters more than it sounds. A whole peanut fed to a chick can choke it, so in spring, when there are young in the nest, a mesh feeder is the safe way to put peanuts out. It also stops a jay emptying the feeder in a couple of visits.

What to put in it

Plain shelled peanuts sold for birds. Not roasted, not salted, not flavoured. Buy them somewhere with turnover and keep them dry, because damp peanuts grow a mould that is genuinely dangerous to birds. If they smell off or look dusty, bin them.

Where to hang it

It is light, so it swings in wind. Pick a spot with some shelter and something solid nearby, a branch or a fence, that birds can stage from. Tip the old crumbs out and rinse the mesh every couple of weeks.

One honest note

Some sellers call this style squirrel proof. It is not. A squirrel can hang off it, and given long enough it will chew at the mesh. What the mesh does do is slow everything down, so nothing empties it in one sitting. If squirrels are the main problem in your yard, hang it on a smooth pole away from anything they can jump from.

Ships within two days. Allow about two weeks for delivery.