Cleaning a hummingbird feeder

Video: How to Clean Your Hummingbird Feeders

Content

To step
Method 1 of 3: Regularly clean the feeder
Method 2 of 3: Kill mold
Method 3 of 3: Maintain the feed container
Tips
Warnings
Necessities

It is important to regularly clean a hummingbird feeder to ensure it is safe for birds. Rinse the food container every time you fill it with hot water. You can also regularly boil the feeder in a pan of water, if the feeder can handle it without deforming. This allows you to remove sugar residues well. Rinse the feeder after cooking as some sugar water will remain in the water you used to cook the feeder. If you can't boil your food container in water, you will need to use mild cleansers like white vinegar and hydrogen peroxide more often. However, if you see black mold, you will need to soak the food container longer in vinegar and hydrogen peroxide until the mold spores are killed. You can also use diluted bleach, but it is important to rinse away all bleach residue before refilling the feeder. After cleaning, maintain the feeder by regularly replacing the nectar and thoroughly cleaning the feeder once a month. The nectar will ferment if you don't regularly add new nectar to the feeder. This will damage the birds' organs. The fermented liquid can stay clear, so you can't just see if the liquid is cloudy to know if you need to replace the nectar. Black mold will grow in the feeder if you neglect it even more and the birds will die more quickly than from tainted nectar.

To step

Method 1 of 3: Regularly clean the feeder

Pour all the nectar out of the food container. You will likely put nectar in your food container, so make sure to pour all of the nectar out of the food container before cleaning it. You can just throw the nectar down the drain. Once birds have eaten the nectar, the liquid will contain mold and other pollutants, so don't keep any sugar water leftovers in your food container. You can later make more nectar from sugar and water or fill the food container with nectar from the store. If you buy nectar in the store, choose the colorless variety and not nectar with added red coloring. Birds are attracted to the red parts of the food container and do not need petroleum based dyes. The birds prefer to eat cane sugar instead of beet sugar. Never use anything other than these two sugars.
Disassemble the food container. You may need the user manual to disassemble the feeder. However, it is often clear how to disassemble a feeder. You can usually see the knobs and screws that you need to loosen to take the feeder apart.
- However, if you are in any doubt at all, check the owner's manual to make sure you don't damage the feeder. If you have lost the user manual, you can enter the model and name of the feeder in a search engine.You may be able to find the user manual on the internet. With some feeders it is recommended to use soap. However, soap does not kill black mold and is difficult to remove without leaving a residue that is bad for bird stomachs.
Choose a cleaner. Usually it is not necessary to use bleach unless there is black mold in the feeder. Weaker cleaners like hydrogen peroxide and vinegar usually work best because they are less likely to leave harmful residues.
- Unless you see mold, use white vinegar or hydrogen peroxide with a strength of 3%. Dilute the vinegar with water. Use two parts water to one part vinegar.
- You can also use regular dish soap. Boil the food container in a large pot of water to remove all soap residue, because even a small amount of soap damages the stomach lining of the birds by attacking the cells in the stomach. If you cannot cook the feeder without warping, do not use soap or use only a small amount of soap and soak the feeder in a large pot of water, stirring occasionally. Then rinse the food container very thoroughly.
Let the feeder soak. Fill the sink with the cleaner of your choice. Let the feeder soak for a few hours. This way, toxins will be removed and it will be easier for you to scrub the dirt off the container.
Scrub the inside of the food container. Use a thin bottle brush to clean the various nooks and crannies in the feeder. Scrub the inside of the food container with the bottle brush. Make sure to remove any nectar and sugar residue, as the residue can contaminate new nectar and cause it to spoil. To remove the sugar residue without scrubbing, boil the food container, if possible without deforming it. If you prefer not to scrub and there is some mold in the feeder, you can soak the feeder in an active chemical bath with vinegar or hydrogen peroxide. If you soak the food container long enough, all biofilms (such as mold) should be killed. Remember, scrubbing won't always remove all microscopic material.
- After soaking, you should be able to easily remove the residue. You shouldn't have to use too much force when scrubbing.
Rinse the food container completely. Rinse the food container under the hot tap. Rinse all parts until the rinse water is clean. It is very important to rinse the feeder completely to prevent harmful residue from entering the nectar for the hummingbirds.
Let the food container dry completely. Place the food container in the house in a dry, safe place. Allow the food container to air dry before reassembling and replacing it. How long this takes depends on the humidity level. It can take several hours to overnight for the feeder to dry.

Method 2 of 3: Kill mold

Dilute the bleach. Clean the food container with bleach, hydrogen peroxide or vinegar if there is black mold in the container. Never use bleach without diluting it first as it can be dangerous. Also make sure you wear gloves when working with bleach and that the area in which you work is well ventilated. Vinegar and hydrogen peroxide are weaker and take longer to kill and remove black mold. However, no toxic dioxins are created when vinegar and hydrogen peroxide react with organic compounds such as sugar.
- To dilute bleach, mix 60 ml of bleach with 4 liters of water. It is easiest to put the bleach and water in a large bucket.
Let the food container soak in the bleach mixture for an hour. This is important to get rid of any mold and mold spores that could be harmful to the hummingbirds. Immerse all parts of the food container in the bleach mixture. Let the parts soak for an hour.
- Don't forget to wear gloves when working with bleach.
Clean the feeder with a bottle brush. Keep your gloves on and remove the food container parts from the bleach mixture. Clean all parts of the feeder with the bottle brush.
- Make sure to scrub any leftover black mold off the feeder. There should be no black mold in the feeder when you put it back in place.
- Wear gloves while cleaning.
Rinse the food container thoroughly. It is important to rinse the food container as bleach can be dangerous to birds. Rinse the bleach container under hot tap until the rinse water runs clear. Bleach reacts with organic compounds such as sugar, producing toxic dioxins. It is therefore strongly recommended to boil the feeder in a large pot of water after rinsing to ensure that all residual bleach is removed. If your food container consists partly of a plastic that cannot be cooked, soak the food container in a large pan of water for several hours and stir the water every now and then.
Fill the food container with new nectar. After you've cleaned a food container with bleach, you don't have to let it air dry. You can simply refill the feeder and put it back in place. However, if the feeder is very wet, pat it lightly with a towel before putting it back in place.

Method 3 of 3: Maintain the feed container

Clean the feeder often enough, depending on the season. During the warmer months you will have to clean the feeder more often. If it is 32 ° C or warmer, it may even be necessary to add new liquid to the feeder twice a day. The liquid ferments very quickly. Do not place hummingbird feeders in areas exposed to direct sunlight, as this will spoil the liquid more quickly. When it is 26 ° C or warmer, it is a good idea to add new liquid to the container every day. Above 21 ° C, the liquid may last longer than a day. Remember, you cannot just wait for the liquid to become cloudy and then replace it, as clear liquid can also be overly fermented. Beer appears clear but is highly fermented.
Regularly add new nectar to the food container. Keep a close eye on the nectar and throw it away if necessary. How long the nectar will last depends on the ambient temperature, how clean the feed container was before refilling, how many openings allow the air to pass through and whether the feed container is in direct sunlight.
- If it is very hot and the food container is in direct sunlight, the nectar can spoil within a day.
Clean the feeder at least once a week in hot weather. Check the feeder from time to time for greasy residues. This could mean that there is black mold in the container. If the food container consists of parts that can be cooked, you cook it more often than you clean it thoroughly. If you clean the food container thoroughly every now and then, you can cook it three times in a row for half an hour and let it cool down. This kills fungal spores that do not die quickly due to the boiling water. You can also soak the feeder in hydrogen peroxide or vinegar for an hour or more. If you notice a lot of black mold in the feeder, soak it in vinegar, hydrogen peroxide, or a mixture of 1 part bleach and 10 parts water. After soaking you should no longer see mold on the feeder. If you still see mold, let the feeder soak until the mold has disappeared.

Tips

Buy several food containers so you can use one at a time and have another to replace the first one while it is being cleaned. That way you don't delay cleaning the food container that is being used.
To make cleaning easier and to ensure that most of the nectar is consumed during feeding sessions, only partially fill the food container with nectar. You will need to keep an eye on the food containers to see how little you can put in them before the birds run out of nectar. The goal is to find out the smallest amount of nectar that can be used to minimize the disposal of nectar while ensuring that the birds always have food. Small food containers can easily be filled up to a third in the case of territorial birds. In places where many southern hummingbird species live, you may need to add more liquid to the food container because more birds will eat from the food container.

Warnings

In many parts of the United States, tap water contains chlorine gas or chloramine. Boiling or leaving the water often evaporates the chlorine, but this does not work with chloramine. This will remain in the water. In the United States, rural spring water is sometimes contaminated with arsenic and other chemicals. The spring water there often also contains too much iron for the birds.
Mold can grow in a dirty food container, which can cause the hummingbirds to become sick and die. Regularly clean food containers with nectar in them. The nectar ferments even faster than black mold growing in the feed container. Even clear liquid can already be fermented. When you open the food container you should be able to smell if the liquid is already fermenting. Hummingbirds are very small and fermented liquid is bad for them, as is black mold. Contrary to popular belief, you cannot wait until the liquid has become cloudy to replace it. Clear liquid can also be over-fermented and no longer healthy for the birds.
When bleach residues react with organic compounds such as sugar, very toxic dioxin molecules are formed. So make sure that bleach residues never come into contact with the sugar water in the feed container.
Some companies sell nectar with red dye. The birds are no more attracted to this than to the red plastic parts of the feeder. This extra chemical won't make the birds any healthier, either. The dye in question is made from petroleum. Some companies also sell copper compounds to add to the nectar to prevent it from spoiling. The birds will therefore become deficient in zinc because they need an equal amount of copper and zinc. Do not add copper to the nectar or use preservatives. Boil the sugar water and use distilled water as the water source.
Birds make their nests near food containers, so it is necessary to keep food containers clean and full of nectar throughout the bird season. The birds will return to the same spot the following season. Many common species, especially northern ones, compete with each other for feed keepers. So if you want to feed more birds, you will have to put up more food containers. Place them far enough apart so that the birds cannot see other birds eating from "their" food containers.