Garden Gate readers Garth and Peggy Drummond of Freetown have a red-bellied woodpecker visiting their bird feeders on a regular basis. This bird is listed in the PEI Field Check list of birds as being an occasional visitor in winter and spring and accidental in summer and autumn. This one must be an early check – in for winter residency.
The Cornell Lab of Ornithology website tells us that this woodpecker has a black and white barred back and a red cap. In the “cool facts” section, they tell us that these birds sometimes wedge nuts into crevices and then whack away at them to break them into pieces. They store food in cracks of trees and fence posts for later use.
It sounds like starlings give these woodpeckers a hard time, in some areas taking over half of their nests. At feeders, the only bird that this woodpecker will not push away is the blue jay. In the last 100 years, the range of this bird has moved northward and within its range, populations are increasing. So maybe by and by, this bird will become a more common sight at our feeders.

Far reaching effects

Who would believe that floods last spring in Manitoba would have an effect on the chickadees in my front yard? This week I went to buy a fifty pound bag of sunflower seeds at a feed store and to my dismay I learned that the price of sunflower seeds has gone up significantly. It seems that Manitoba is a major supplier of sunflower seeds and last spring’s floods seriously reduced this fall’s harvest. Just how seriously I found out by checking out the web site www.albertafarmexpress.ca. It claims that this year the Manitoba sunflower crop was estimated at 16,400 tonnes compared with 67,500 tonnes a year ago.
So what do we do when the price of sunflower seeds makes us think twice about buying them? Well, first I’ll say that in my opinion they are the best all purpose feed that we have for our back yard birds. Sunflower seeds attract a huge variety of birds, both small ones and the average sized birds like blue jays, etc. We can make a bag of feed last a lot longer by just putting out a fixed amount every morning and leaving it at that. Be choosy about the feeders too. A plain old platform feeder may be simple and attract a lot of birds but some feeders will slow the consumption of seeds as the birds have to put forth more effort to get them.
What about alternative feed sources? Seed mixes may have their place but take a good look at what you are buying. Some are filled with wheat or other seeds that are of little interest to birds.
Cracked corn is another possibility but it doesn’t hold up well in a feeder and I always fear that what lands on the ground will attract rodents before the ground feeders clean it up. The ground feeding birds such as the gray partridge are partial to corn. I’m not sure that it appeals to song birds.
Then there’s nyger seed. It’s always expensive so I just use it as a “side dish,” not the main course. Finches line up for the nyger seed feeders. And we can put out suet and peanut /cornmeal mixtures to attract wood peckers.
So, readers, we can still have a great winter at the feeders.

Cavendish?

According to Wikipedia, most of the bananas grown commercially in the world belong to a group of cultivars known as the Cavendish group. I guess I have mental blinders on but when I think of Cavendish, I think about PEI, sandy beaches, Green Gables and Anne.
Wikipedia tells us that Cavendish bananas came originally from China and Vietnam. They entered commercial production in 1903 but didn’t gain prominence until the 1950s when Panama disease wiped out the predominant variety of that day. So the odds are good that when you buy bananas in the grocery store, be they organic or otherwise, they will be of the Cavendish group.
Why are they called Cavendish? There’s a connection to a William Spencer Cavendish in England.

Clean –up crew

Have you seen any of the foxes that patrol Charlottetown parking lots at night these days? They are not the least bit shy and I’ve seen them in several places. I don’t feed them but they must find food there of some sort. There are no mice hiding in long grass in these locations!

New catalogue

The Stokes Catalogue arrived this week. With the Stokes catalogue, I find that what’s new is not as important as what’s old. For as long as I’ve been getting Stokes catalogue, there has been very important fine print that accompanies the description of each vegetable, flower, herb, etc. It tells you about seeding rates, about starting the plants both indoors and outdoors when appropriate (very detailed), and any other info that they deem necessary for success. Just keep in mind that when they talk about when to set plants outdoors that they are talking about Ontario and our last spring frost may be later that it is in some areas there.

Gardening Comments or Questions? Drop me a line at 471 New Glasgow Road, Ebenezer, PE, C1E 0S8 or bcobb@pei.sympatico.ca.