Colorado Springs, Colorado

Eric & Dana Breier

We’re passionate about birds and nature. That’s why we opened a Wild Birds Unlimited Nature Shop in our community.

Colorado Springs, Colorado

3350 N. Union Blvd.,
(NE Corner of Union Blvd & Templeton Gap Rd)
Colorado Springs, CO 80907

Phone: (719) 596-1819
Email: Send Message

Store Hours:
Mon - Sat: 9:00 am - 5:00 pm
Sun: Closed

Comments:
If you'd like help identifying a new bird to your backyard, please click on the link "Online Bird Identification Tool" above. It's a great resource we're offering customers and visitors to our website. Happy Birding!

We can show you how to turn your yard into a birdfeeding habitat that brings song, color and life to your home.

Being Seasonally Savvy: Cashing in on Caching

Right now chickadees, nuthatches, titmice and jays are hiding food to retrieve and eat later this season. This behavior is called “caching.” Caching helps birds survive during bad weather and when food sources are low. These birds can store hundreds of seeds a day. Each seed is placed in a different location and they generally remember where each one is, even months later.

By providing a foundational feeder filled with their favorite foods, you can help your birds with their caching needs. Recent research has shown that a consistent and reliable source of food helps birds to build body fat reserves, reduces their physiological stress and helps to maintain a healthy body condition.

Chickadees prefer to cache black oil sunflower seeds; often eating a small portion before tucking it away in the bark or crevices of a wood pile or branch of a tree. They will even cache them under the dead leaves & mulch in your winter gardens. Take a peek in your gutters, around roof shingles and in clusters of pine needles and you may find their prize! Chickadees tend to do more of this caching behavior in the middle of the day and within 130 feet of bird feeders.
Nuthatches prefer heavier sunflower seeds over the lighter ones - giving them more nutrition per bite. Be sure to have some sunflower chips in your blend, too, as they like these 25% more than ones in the shell. They prefer to hide foods on deeply furrowed tree trunks and the underside of branches. Nuthatches are also known to hide seeds under a shingle or behind wooden siding.
Jays love to cache peanuts, sunflower seeds, acorns and pine nuts. They are especially fond of peanuts in the shell. They bury them in the ground and are known to cache about 100 in a day; emptying a feeder in no time. Watch for them make repeated trips to your feeders (or an oak or pine tree) and fly off. They can travel up to two miles to bury their nutritious treasure.

Stop by the store and we can help recommend food and feeders to add to your backyard to insure a front row seat to this annual cache and dash event going on now!