abaddon
Veteran Member
- Joined
- Aug 13, 2003
- Messages
- 2,321
I don't know what to do. House finches with infected eyes keep showing up at my bird feeder.
I found three kinds of advice on the net:
1) take the feeder down, throw out all your seed, wash everything with bleach, and keep the feeder down for 2 weeks till the bird with the eye infection has gone away;
2) wash the feeder frequently, and if the finches are crowding it then put up another feeder to help them keep their distance from one another;
3) ignore it. The infected birds will just congregate at other feeders in the area if you take yours down.
The first time I saw an infected bird at the feeder, I followed #1. After putting the feeder back up after the scrubdown and 2-week wait, there's now another infected house finch again.
The bird's health matters more than me wanting to watch them and take pictures. But, this is important to me so I'm really hesitant about removing the feeder.
I found three kinds of advice on the net:
1) take the feeder down, throw out all your seed, wash everything with bleach, and keep the feeder down for 2 weeks till the bird with the eye infection has gone away;
2) wash the feeder frequently, and if the finches are crowding it then put up another feeder to help them keep their distance from one another;
3) ignore it. The infected birds will just congregate at other feeders in the area if you take yours down.
The first time I saw an infected bird at the feeder, I followed #1. After putting the feeder back up after the scrubdown and 2-week wait, there's now another infected house finch again.
The bird's health matters more than me wanting to watch them and take pictures. But, this is important to me so I'm really hesitant about removing the feeder.