feeding gold finches

[cecil39]

for the past few years I have put out niger seed for the goldies, but have recently been told that they like sunflower hearts, surely they would be to big for these little birds to eat, i thought they had have tiny seeds.

[boxtops]

Goldfinches feed on various tree seeds, such as alder and birch, and on thistle, teasel and dandelion seeds, which it can obtain owing to its thin bill and light weight.

Niger seed and teasels may attract them in gardens, especially if there are no fields nearby with thistles and dandelions, but they will also feed on sunflower hearts.

[ladybirder]

They just LURVE sunflower hearts.

[cecil39]

thank you both, that means I can get rid of the horrible black patch on my lawn the niger seeds leave and still attract the goldies, by the way I thought niger seed should be treated so it don't grow, but its grown like cress in all my fower pots near the feeders and I know its that as I let one grow and googled it.

[heathfield]

The best quality niger seeds will be heat-treated to prevent them from germinating. I have never found these on sale round my way. Like you, my lawn developed a black patch, so I changed to sunflower hearts. Finches have strong thick beaks which enable them to easily break up larger seeds like sunflower.

[nungate]

They get through packets of sunflower seed hearts in my garden, they niger seed is popular but they hang around the sunflower seeds more often than not

[wildwood]

Presuming you are in the UK... Even though goldies have pointy weak looking beaks, they can manipulate the seeds until they can feel the seam of each seed and can crack it with relatively little effort. Dried sunflower seeds is another story.

They love all types of thistle seeds and if you have a rough patch in your garden (or over the fence) sprinkle a packet of cosmos seeds in Spring and you'll be overun with them when the flowers set seed in Autumn. They seem to be able to tell each other where the goodies are.

[pusskin]

My gold finch birds got nuts over sunflower hearts so much that i dont buy niger seeds any more!