Ground Guard

Providing food on the ground is an important part of garden bird feeding, as some species of bird cannot use hanging feeders - or at least not easily. However, a ready supply of food such as Sunflower Hearts or suet pellets fed from a ground tray or direct on the ground, will often attract larger species of bird such as Jackdaw, Wood pigeon and Rook. This can mean that food intended for ground feeding species of songbird such as the Robin, can quickly be taken - plus the presence of the larger species will often deter small birds from feeding.
The solution to this problem is a bird feeder with a cage guard, with the basic principle being that small birds like Robins can access food placed within the cage, whereas larger species such as Jackdaws can’t.
An important consideration if using the small mesh bird feeder cage ground guard, is that it will prevent species of thrush and Blackbirds from getting any food. Given that Song thrushes and Blackbirds are essentially ground feeding species, this could mean they miss out on the benefits of your efforts to provide food for your garden birds. Therefore it’s best practice to also have at least some food available on a bird table to ground feeder, which isn’t covered.