Feeder Types
Nyjer and Finch Feeders
Most nyjer feeders fail for one reason, and it is not the feeder. Nyjer dries out, loses its oil and stops interesting goldfinches long before the tube looks empty.
The short answer
- Nyjer feeders are built around a tiny seed: ports of roughly 1/8 inch (3 mm) or mesh of about the same opening, or the seed simply pours out.
- Stale nyjer is the number one cause of an ignored finch feeder. The seed dries out and loses the oil that makes it worth eating, usually within a few weeks outdoors.
- Mesh feeders let more birds feed at once and dry faster after rain. Tube feeders protect seed better and are easier to clean. Both are valid.
- Buy small bags. A 20-pound sack is a false economy unless you are running several feeders through a hard winter.
- Finch socks are cheap and effective for a season, then they fray and hold damp. Treat them as consumable, not permanent.
A nyjer feeder is a tube or mesh cylinder with openings small enough to hold a seed about 1/8 inch (3 mm) long. That single constraint drives the whole design, and it is why nyjer cannot share a feeder with sunflower: a standard sunflower port pours nyjer onto the ground.
The birds are worth the dedicated hardware. American goldfinches (Spinus tristis), lesser goldfinches, pine siskins, house finches, purple finches and redpolls all take nyjer, and several of them will visit a nyjer feeder more readily than anything else you can hang.
Before the hardware, though, the seed. Most complaints about finch feeders are complaints about stale nyjer wearing a feeder's clothing, so that is where this page starts.
Freshness is the whole ballgame#
Nyjer is an oilseed. Its appeal to a goldfinch is fat, and fat is exactly what disappears when the seed sits in a warm feeder for a month. The shell hardens, the kernel dries, and finches that were feeding daily go elsewhere without any visible change in the feeder.
This creates a maddening pattern: the feeder looks full, nothing is wrong with it, and the birds have simply stopped. People buy a second feeder. The second feeder works for two weeks and then stops too.
Two checks tell you where you stand:
- Pinch test. Crack a few seeds with a fingernail. Fresh nyjer has a pale, slightly moist kernel and leaves a faint oily mark. Stale nyjer is dry and dusty inside and crumbles.
- Pour test. Fresh nyjer pours in a smooth dark stream. Old nyjer carries visible dust and broken shell, and it clumps where humidity has reached it.
Buy small bags on purpose
A 20-pound (9 kg) sack of nyjer is cheaper per pound and usually the wrong purchase. Unless you are running three feeders through a northern winter, buy what you will use in about six weeks, and keep it sealed and cool. Storage that actually preserves oil content is covered in storing bird seed, and the seed itself in nyjer (thistle) seed.
Mesh versus tube#
Both designs work. They fail differently, which is the useful way to choose.
| Mesh feeder | Tube feeder | |
|---|---|---|
| Birds feeding at once | Many; birds cling anywhere | Limited to the number of ports |
| Rain resistance | Poor; seed gets wet | Good; seed column stays dry |
| Drying after rain | Fast; air passes through | Slow; damp seed sits in the column |
| Cleaning | Harder; mesh traps residue | Easier if the base unscrews |
| Selectivity | Low; any clinging bird | Higher; port and perch geometry filters |
| Waste | Higher; seed shaken loose | Lower |
The practical summary: mesh in dry climates and busy yards, tube in wet climates and quiet ones. A mesh feeder that soaks and then dries out fast is generally healthier than a tube that keeps a damp core for a week, but a tube that never gets wet beats both.
Mesh gauge matters. Openings around 1/8 inch (3 mm) hold nyjer while letting birds extract it. Fine mesh under about 1/16 inch (1.5 mm) frustrates birds and traps dust; coarse mesh sized for sunflower hearts dumps nyjer on the ground.
Ports, perches and who gets to feed#
On a tube nyjer feeder, three details set the experience.
Port size. Roughly 1/8 inch (3 mm), often a narrow slot rather than a round hole. Slots suit a finch bill and slow the flow.
Perch position. Standard perches sit below the port. Inverted or upside-down nyjer feeders put the perch above the port, so a bird has to hang head-down to feed. Goldfinches do this without hesitation. House sparrows and house finches are markedly less willing, which makes an inverted feeder a genuine tool if sparrows are crowding out the goldfinches. See controlling house sparrows at feeders.
Perch length. Under about 3/4 inch (2 cm). Finches need very little, and nothing bigger should be comfortable on a nyjer feeder anyway.
The two-feeder trick for a big flock
Goldfinches feed in loose flocks and squabble constantly at a crowded feeder. Two feeders 10 to 15 feet (3 to 4.5 m) apart will hold noticeably more birds than one feeder with twice the ports, because a dominant bird can only guard one at a time. The spacing logic applies across the yard; see how many feeders and how far apart.
Finch socks, honestly#
A finch sock is a fine nylon mesh bag, usually holding 1 to 2 pounds (0.5 to 1 kg), hung from a loop. They are the cheapest way to test whether your yard has finches at all, and they often outperform expensive tubes in the first week because the whole surface is usable.
What they are good at: cost, immediate acceptance, holding a lot of birds on a small footprint, easy storage in the off season.
What they are bad at: they hold moisture against the seed, they cannot be cleaned in any meaningful sense, and once the mesh frays the seed spills. Some birds also pull at loose threads. Treat a sock as a consumable that lasts a season, take it down during extended rain, and do not try to rescue a wet one.
Crowded finch feeders spread disease
House finches and goldfinches crowding a shared surface is exactly the situation in which house finch eye disease spreads, and salmonella outbreaks at feeders have repeatedly involved finches and siskins. If you see a bird with swollen, crusted or closed eyes, take the feeder down for one to two weeks, clean it thoroughly, and spread your feeding out when you put it back. See house finch eye disease and there is a sick bird at my feeder.
Placement for finches specifically#
Finches are less nervous than chickadees about open ground and will feed in the open more readily, but they still want an escape route.
- 10 to 15 feet (3 to 4.5 m) from a tree or tall shrub, close enough to bolt to.
- 5 feet (1.5 m) up. Squirrels rarely bother with nyjer, but raccoons will pull a feeder down out of curiosity and the seed underneath draws ground feeders.
- Away from your sunflower feeder, by at least 15 feet (4.5 m). Nyjer competes badly with sunflower hearts in a direct comparison, and finches that can see both will often take the sunflower.
- Somewhere the spill zone does not matter. Nyjer will not germinate, since imported seed is heat-treated, but the hull dust builds into a black mat under a busy feeder.
Regional timing matters too. In much of the north, nyjer traffic peaks in late fall and winter when siskins move through, and drops sharply in midsummer when goldfinches shift to natural seed heads and nesting. More on the annual pattern in how to attract goldfinches and how to attract house and purple finches.
Cleaning, and why nyjer feeders need it more#
Nyjer's fine hull dust combines with moisture into a black paste that clings to port collars, mesh and the inside of the tube. It is not obvious until you take the feeder apart, and it is the reason a feeder can hold apparently fine seed that no bird touches.
Every two to three weeks:
- Empty the feeder completely. Do not top up nyjer, ever. The bottom of the column is the oldest and dampest seed you own.
- Wash in hot soapy water with a narrow bottle brush; use an old toothbrush on port collars.
- Disinfect with a dilute bleach solution, following the ratios in safe disinfectants for feeders, then rinse.
- Dry completely, ideally in sun, before refilling. A damp tube ruins fresh seed in days.
Mesh feeders benefit from a stiff brush across the outside first, to knock the crust out of the openings. The full method is in how to clean a bird feeder, and the wet seed problem generally is in moldy, clumped or wet seed.
What to do if your feeder has been quiet for a month#
Work through this in order. Most yards fail at step one.
- Dump the seed. All of it, into the trash, not back into the bag.
- Wash and dry the feeder completely.
- Buy a small fresh bag from somewhere with turnover, and check the pinch test before you fill.
- Fill it half full. Less seed means faster turnover and less staleness.
- Move it to within 15 feet (4.5 m) of cover if it is not already, following moving a feeder without losing the birds.
- Wait two weeks. Finches find new feeders on their own schedule; the general timeline is in how long until birds find a new feeder.
- If there is still nothing, check whether your area has finches at all this season. Siskin numbers in particular swing enormously from year to year, and a quiet winter is a real possibility rather than a fault in your setup.
Frequently asked questions#
Why are finches not using my nyjer feeder?
Almost always stale seed. Nyjer dries out and loses oil content within a few weeks of being outdoors, and finches simply stop taking it even though the feeder looks full. Empty the feeder, pinch a few seeds between your fingernails to check for a moist, oily kernel, and refill with a fresh small bag. If the seed is fresh and birds still ignore it, the feeder may be too new, too far from cover, or already outcompeted by a sunflower feeder nearby.
Is nyjer the same as thistle?
No, though it is sold as thistle seed. Nyjer is the seed of Guizotia abyssinica, an African and Asian oilseed crop unrelated to the thistles in your lawn. It is imported and heat-treated before sale so it cannot germinate, which is why spilled nyjer under a feeder sprouts nothing. The confusion dates to old marketing, not botany.
Should I choose a mesh or a tube nyjer feeder?
Mesh if you have a busy finch flock, since birds can cling anywhere on the surface and many feed at once. Tube if you get frequent rain or want easier cleaning, since a tube shields the seed column and comes apart for washing. Mesh dries faster after a soaking; tubes stop the soaking happening in the first place.
Do finch socks work?
Yes, for a season. A nylon mesh sock is cheap, holds a pound or two of nyjer, and goldfinches cling to it readily. The drawbacks are that it holds moisture against the seed, it cannot be cleaned properly, and the mesh frays where birds pull at it. Replace rather than repair, and take it down during long wet spells.
What size ports does a nyjer feeder need?
About 1/8 inch (3 mm), roughly a third the size of a sunflower port. Nyjer is a slender seed only a few millimeters long, so anything wider lets it pour out with every bird visit. This is why nyjer cannot go in a general-purpose tube feeder and requires a dedicated one.
How long does nyjer seed last in a feeder?
Two to four weeks outdoors, less in heat or humidity. In a sealed container out of the sun, an unopened bag holds for a few months. The failure is drying rather than rotting: the seed loses oil, the shell hardens, and birds lose interest well before it looks bad.