Problem Solving

Will a Suet Feeder Stop a Woodpecker Pecking My House?

No. Cornell researchers put suet feeders on houses under active attack, and the holes kept coming. What decides whether a house gets hit is its siding, its color and the trees around it, and the fix with a record is a barrier, not a decoy.

No. A suet feeder will not stop a woodpecker that has started on your siding. It has been tested on houses under attack, and it was not among the methods that worked with any consistency.

"Put out suet to distract them" is a widely repeated tip. Many people asking already have a suet feeder up and wonder whether it brought the bird in. Nobody has measured that.

What Cornell tested#

Emily Harding, Paul Curtis and Sandra Vehrencamp of Cornell University tested six deterrents "available commercially, used anecdotally by homeowners, and recommended by wildlife specialists in different Cooperative Extension publications": Prowler Owls, Irri-Tape, the Bird Pro Sound System, Scare-Eyes, suet feeders and roost boxes. (Journal of Wildlife Management, 2007).

Between August 2003 and December 2004, in the Town of Ithaca, New York, they visited 16 homes with active damage about three times a week to measure new holes per day, then placed a deterrent and kept measuring.

The abstract's verdict: "none of the deterrents that we tested was completely successful in keeping woodpeckers from creating new holes in house siding," and "homes where Irri-Tape was installed exhibited the greatest reduction." The Cornell Lab's summary, quoted by Michigan State University Extension, is blunter: "nothing deterred woodpeckers all the time, and only the streamers worked with any consistency."

Seven sources on suet, side by side#

None of these is a bird feeding guide, which is why their suet advice has never been laid side by side. Sorted by date:

The two sources that recommend suet are the 1994 chapter and a 2008 sheet built on it. Every guide revised since 2022 drops suet or argues against it. The one current page still offering it reprints the 1994 text, and even that hedges: "has been recommended," not "works."

Why the suet advice persists#

The idea is intuitive: give a hungry bird easier food. It sits in a 1994 chapter that later fact sheets cite; Connecticut's 2008 sheet lists it as a source and repeats the tip a year after the Cornell test. The test sits in a journal; the tip sits in the fact sheets people find.

It also misreads the bird. Most damage to houses is not about hunger. Marsh notes that many species "will drill holes in sound dry wood of buildings, utility poles, and fence posts where few or no insects exist," and puts most of the damage from February through June, "the breeding season and the period of territory establishment." A bird drumming for a mate or digging a roost is not looking for a meal.

Read the damage first#

Only one of the four patterns involves food at all.

Drumming rarely does real damage, Connecticut says, though it can last "for several weeks in early spring." Colorado State suggests expanding foam behind a drummed board to kill the resonance. More in our northern flicker and downy woodpecker profiles.

Insect furrows are the one case where food matters. Connecticut notes the searching "may or may not indicate the presence of insect pests," and Colorado State says that in Colorado, woodpeckers hammer for insects "primarily during the first two years after house construction." A suet feeder does not empty the wall of larvae. If insects are there, treat them with birds in mind; see pesticides and birds.

Acorn storage is its own problem, covered on the acorn woodpecker page.

Which houses get hit#

The same Cornell team surveyed 1,185 houses in Ithaca from March 2001 to April 2002, published in Human-Wildlife Conflicts in 2009. A third, 33%, had woodpecker problems, either damage or noise. The abstract names three factors:

• Siding type. "The probability of woodpecker-inflicted damage on a house was strongly dependent on siding type." Grooved plywood was the most likely to be damaged, ahead of tongue-and-groove, board-and-batten, clapboard and nonwood siding.
• Trees. The probability of damage rose with tree density in the yard.
• Stain. "Stained houses suffered greater probabilities of woodpecker damage in all wooded yards."

The Internet Center for Wildlife Damage Management puts a number on the worst case: houses with wood siding in earth-toned stains are "at the highest risk (97%) of damage in the northeast US." The 2007 abstract adds that "brightly painted houses (white, light blue, pastels) were less likely to attract woodpeckers." Virginia Tech's summary of the Cornell work notes that the age or weathering of the finish did not seem to matter; the color did.

So the lever is the next paint job, not the feeder: on wood siding in a wooded yard, paint a light color rather than restaining.

Fixes with a record#

Speed matters. Colorado State says to "take immediate action" because woodpeckers "are not easily driven from their territories or pecking sites once they are established."

• Bird netting. UC IPM calls physical exclusion "by far the most effective" method. Run it from the outer edge of the eave to the siding below the damage, at least 3 inches off the wall so the bird cannot peck through. UC IPM and Marsh give 3/4 inch mesh, Virginia Tech 5/8 inch or smaller; 5/8 inch satisfies both. Close the sides so no bird is trapped behind it.
• Metal over the holes. Hardware cloth, flashing or sheet metal, painted to match. Virginia Tech says to extend it at least 6 to 12 inches past the damage on every side, or the bird moves over and carries on.
• Reflective tape or streamers. The best performer in the Cornell test, and the only scare device Cornell says worked "with any consistency." Hang it to move in the wind across the damage.
• Mirrors and hawk mobiles. Colorado State calls 7-1/2 inch magnifying mirrors and hawk silhouette mobiles "successful frightening devices" on preliminary research. The Internet Center warns that a woodpecker seeing its reflection in a window frame may hit harder.
• Repair the holes. Connecticut and Colorado State both say to cover or fill holes promptly, since open holes draw more pecking.

What does not work: plastic owls and hawk models (UC IPM: "ineffective"), ultrasonic devices (Marsh: pitched "above the range of most birds too"), and sticky repellents, which Colorado State discourages because they "may fatally injure or trap birds."

What to do with your suet feeder#

The evidence settles one question and leaves the other open. Our reading:

• No damage, woodpeckers on the feeder: keep feeding. Nothing we read measured feeding as a cause, and woodpeckers at a suet cage are the point of the suet guide and of attracting woodpeckers.
• Damage has started, no feeder up: do not put one up as a cure. That is the remedy Cornell tested. Go straight to netting or tape.
• Damage has started, suet already up: Virginia Tech and UC IPM both point toward removing it, and doing so costs little. Take the suet down while you install the barrier and through spring, when Marsh puts most damage. If the bird is drumming or digging a roost, expect no change from that alone.
• Summer: both Marsh and Connecticut warn that soft suet can mat a woodpecker's head feathers. Use a no-melt dough in heat; the ratios are in homemade suet recipes. If starlings are what is emptying the cage, that is a separate fix.

Moving the feeder away from the house helps with spill and rodents, but no source tested distance against woodpecker damage.

The law#

Woodpeckers are protected under the federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918, and UC IPM notes that lethal removal requires a permit from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Virginia Tech says agencies will not usually issue one until every other option has failed, and that another bird "will often fill the void." Colorado State says flicker control permits are not issued May 15 through August 15, and a nest with eggs or young must be left until they fledge. The same federal law covers hawks at the feeder.

Before sealing a roost hole, the Cornell Lab says, make sure no birds are inside.

Where this page stops applying#

• Outside the Northeast. Both Cornell studies were in Ithaca, New York. Colorado State says the northern flicker does most of the damage to Colorado homes and that synthetic stucco gets drilled too.
• Trees, not houses. Rows of small holes ringing a trunk are a sapsucker. Marsh suggests wrapping the worked area in 1/4 inch hardware cloth, plastic mesh or burlap.
• Offering a cavity instead. Colorado State suggests a flicker nest box near the damage where other methods fail; UC IPM says boxes do not consistently help. Specifications are in nest boxes and roost boxes, and a standing snag gives the birds their own wood.