Wagner's 62051 Nyjer Seed Wild Bird Food, 5-Pound Bag

Very good quality and decent price. Finches love this seed. Doves don't eat it. I placed mine in an open bowl and a big mess of them scattering around. It needs to be in a feeder more controlled so it does not scatter. I use White Proso Millet and Sunflower Kernels Medium Grind (broken and shelled) so the doves and finches can eat them easily. Whole sunflower seed even when shelled are too large for small birds, so get the medium grind instead. I use a large wood tray on the fence. I place two poultry chick feeders on it, filled with White Proso Millet topped with sunflower kernels. The birds have to stick their heads in to eat, preventing fighting and scratching and scattering of food. Then I place some Nyjer seed in a bowl in the middle so finches can gather and eat. The tray catches any mess that is cleared up by birds in the morning before I put out the seeds again. This system works well. However, finches like to eat in a group an and are intimidated by doves. Having a finch hanging feeder for Nyjer will keep away doves and focus on Finches only. A better solution.I never use squirrel guards. They are cruel and only make squirrels angry and frustrated. Instead, I have 2 squirrel feed trays attached to fence. Each one has a bowl of sunflower kernels and a bowl of nuts - walnuts, almonds, peanuts. Now the squirrels don't attack each other or birds to get at the food and birds can eat in peace. Harmony. Putting out food creates aggression, agitation, competition for resources in wildlife. You have to manage it to get balance and peace and no wastage of the food. Giving doves a platform - they love it. Giving squirrels their own bowls, they leave birds alone, do not bully them, and don't overturn bird feeders. Giving finches a separate feeding space means they can gather with their own kind and not be bullied by doves or squirrels.

Goldfinches and House Finches love this seed. Always fresh and that is important to them

Good finch feed.

Once I hung the feeder the pretty House Finches went right for it. I now have a small "finch farm" with pretty, friendly, pleasantly churping birds.Buy a finch feeder or sock. I repurposed a regular bird feeder to dispense this fine-consistancy seed. The problem with this is that the fine seed flows too fast through the large ports on the feeder. I had to shrink the ports with duct tape. The Finches scatter the black seed and make a mess on my balcony. So I attached an aluminium pie plate to the underside of the feeder to catch some of the waste.The finches divide their time between the finch feeder and the sunflower-filled Cardinal feeder. They pretty much ignore the third "finch food" mix.I am however disappointed with the absence of Gold Finches. I know that they exist in my area, but just not at my feeders. I did spot one the first year but none since. I tried introducing Echinacea plants which are said to attract Gold Finches. But in reality GFs are attracted to Echinacea seeds. As fall approached I discovered that my plants were sterile hybrids that do not produce seeds.The strange spelling of the seed is to protect racial sensibilities - they are native to the African country of Niger.

I used Wagner's Nyjer for several years until Home Depot stopped carrying it. I then tried several other brands, and the goldfinches largely ignored my efforts. I have had very few goldfinches at my feeder over the last few years. I then bought Wagner's Nyjer on Amazon recently, and the goldfinches have returned. Instead of seeing one or two every few days, I now see 5 or 6 every time I look out the window. I will buy no other brand in the future.

I specifically bought safflower and nyjer seeds because we are inundated with starlings for the first time. They have always been in my neighborhood by the hundreds every afternoon around 4 but they land on the wires or a yard, stay there chattering for 5 or 10 minutes, and then leave. I had been using a Lyric Songbird no-mess blend in my window feeders but the starlings descended one day and stripped the feeders clean in minutes. I had 14 of them all at once on each of two 4" x 12" attachable window feeders, fighting with each other for the food. It was like a cartoon. They were stuffed inside, flipping the seed out, on the top, hanging on the perch on the front. If I wasn't so mad I would have been LOL. Actually I was. But I was ripping mad too. I was knocking at the window until I thought I was going to break it. Believe me. They didn't give a hoot. Knock away, sucker. We've got your food. Best in the neighborhood. Hahaha. The same thing happened the next day. I left the feeders empty for over a week and then replaced the songbird mix with half nyjer/half safflower seeds with a few peanuts in their shells mixed in. Everything was great for about 10 days. The cardinals, purple finches, sparrows, chickadees, titmice, nuthatches, bluejays all took a day or so to get used to the new offering and then seemed to love it. I was willing to put up with having to sweep up the seed mess on the walkway under the window if it meant the new mix kept the starlings at bay. It did until 2 days ago. Now the feeders are stripped again, there's seed and poop all over the feeders, the side of my house, and under the window. It was extraordinarily cold here the past two days (-10 with 35 mph winds) and I'm wondering if that's why the starlings are eating food they allegedly hate. I will try one more time and then I'll have to stop feeding the birds I love if the starlings come back. I hate to do it but I can't keep up with the cost and mess caused by the hordes of starlings. I'll post this on the safflower seed site as well so that other buyers will be aware that starlings will eat it. UPDATE: it's been a few weeks since the frigid temps we had on the weekend that the starlings stripped the feeders. Since those two days I have only seen one starling once at the feeders. The nyjer/safflower/peanuts in shell mix is definitely keeping the starlings at bay and the rest of the birds happy. The starlings must've been starving on the frigidly cold days and would have eaten anything for energy. I'm glad I could oblige, I suppose! It's a real mess under the feeders and I have to sweep every day or two to keep the seed from tracking into the house but it is fun to watch the birds fly in and enjoy themselves at the window feeders.

I mix this with bird seed for yard feeders.This helps attract finches, sparrows and other small birds that may not want larger seeds.

You want yellow finches? Buy Nyger seeds. It's that easy.