Why do we keep feeding our delicate birds food that has no nutritional value and has been shown to cause illness?
If the bread crumbs are just one part of the birds’ daily diet, it’s fine to feed them. When birds continue to eat bread instead of more protein-rich seeds or peanuts, they may experience long-term health problems. Bread crumbs have no nutritional value and merely act as a filler, causing them to feel bloated.
While delivering a piece of bread or a few crumbs to a wild bird every once in a while probably won’t help them out much, it also probably won’t hurt them.
Only if you feed birds nothing but bread crumbs seven days a week will you have a problem with them.
If they only consume bread crumbs, they won’t get the healthy fats, protein, and carbohydrates they need from other foods, such as the seeds and peanuts you might feed or find in the wild.
If you don’t eat, you won’t have the stamina to go out and find food, which will eventually lead to illness and death.
Your eating bread crumbs or any other bread-based food will not improve your health, but it’s good to know the possibility exists.
Crumbs function merely as filler, but that can be riskier since bread can expand in the stomach.
Add water to dry bread to make bread crumbs, and use only what you’ll use in a single day’s worth of cooking.
Despite all this, it’s unlikely that anyone will eat your bread because of the abundance of pest birds who will feast on the crumbs.
Contents
OK if fed bread crumbs occasionally
Bread crumbs can be fed, but only in the tiniest amounts, much to how an entire slice of bread would be too much for a bird.
Approximately as many bread crumbs as would fit in the palm of your hand, and that should be plenty for one day.
While it’s fine to distribute bread crumbs to birds of all kinds, it’s important not to give any single visiting bird more than its fair share.
Bread crumbs, regardless of their composition, will expand significantly in the stomachs of these creatures, often tripling in size. Also, a single bird that gorges itself will certainly become very ill.
Only on rare occasions, once or twice a week at most, is it OK to feed birds bread crumbs.
For short-term bird feeding, I recommend holding a handful of seed in your hand and scattering it on the ground, a platform feeder, or any other suitable surface in your garden.
Pasta is a similar but healthier alternative to bread when it comes to feeding birds, and rice that has been cooked is also an excellent option.
Health risks involved
You need to realize that people who feed bread to birds are typically unable to obtain wild bird food at the time they offer the bread.
Unfortuately, the consumption of bread or wheat products of any kind provides zero nutritional benefits.
This is a filler since it is used to satisfy hunger rather than provide any real nourishment to the birds.
Instead of bread or bread crumbs, I recommend feeding wild birds cooked pasta or rice; it’s still just filler, but it’s a little healthier.
Just soak the bread crumbs in water to force possible swelling before it is consumed by the bird (or birds) to counteract the effects of too much bread being eaten.
Because of this, the bread crumbs would expand as far as they could, yet it’s important to exercise caution because further expansion is possible after ingestion.
Mix in to regular bird food
Provide bread crumbs less frequently and in smaller quantities, and only use them to bulk up good wild bird feed to make them healthier.
To a greater extent, birds will feed if there is more bird food visible to them.
The white soft crumbs and the brown crust crumbs can be mixed with far more wild bird seed mixes, and any nuts can be thrown in for good measure.
The birds are more likely to stick to their usual diet and not bother with the bread crumbs.
The sparrow, more than any other bird, is known for its fondness for a diet rich in crumbs of bread.
Soaking bread crumbs to make them heavier and mixing in seeds and peanuts can help keep it stable in windy situations are also good ideas.
If you want to feed birds, make sure they have access to high-quality food, but don’t add bread crumbs, as they won’t survive as long as other types of bird food.
If you’re out of speciality bird feed or you just don’t have very much left and want to make sure the birds can still find their meal, try mixing some bread crumbs in with your standard backyard bird food.
Guarantee birds eat crumbs
Backyard birds at your platform feeder or anywhere you scatter bread crumbs will almost certainly eat the bread.
Keep in mind that most wild birds would probably ignore your bread crumbs since they don’t think they look or taste like anything they would find in the wild.
The trustworthy but invasive house sparrow would be a constant threat to your bread crumbs, since it readily accepts a wide variety of human food waste.
In contrast, common grackles, which are somewhat larger and will consume bread or bread crumbs, are a bit of a surprise.
The common grackle is remarkable in that it is observed soaking bread crumbs in water before consuming them.
Bread crumbs are sometimes extremely scarce, making it more difficult for larger, more troublesome birds to eat them than if they were an entire slice of bread, which pigeons and crows would gladly devour right there and then.
Although some bird species are known to eat bread crumbs, most wild birds eat mostly seeds, such as nuts, wild fruits, and grain.
To summarize
Bread should be supplied to backyard birds in the smallest possible quantity and on the infrequentest possible schedule.
Bread crumbs are a common treat for our feathered friends since they are inexpensive, simple, and easy to find.
When birds choose bread over other, more natural, high-nutrient food that can help them survive the hot summer or the frigid winter, it can be harmful to their health.
Every day, birds use a lot of energy foraging for food in our backyards or in the outdoors, and while seeds and peanuts can restore the nutrients that birds lose, bread serves as a filler alone and has no health advantages at all.
When you eat nothing but filler, you risk developing health problems because your body is not getting the nutrients it needs.
Bread crumbs are not a balanced diet for birds, and it is not good to give them simply that to eat on a regular basis; otherwise, they may become unwell.
Add bread crumbs to peanuts or seed mixes to make it more appetizing, although the crumbs will probably be overlooked.
Similarly, if you soak the bread crumbs in water, the bread will expand in size even though it won’t have to expand in the birds’ stomachs, leading them to feel full faster and eat less.
