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Woodpeckers like suet. Residents can help wildlife survive during extreme temperature swings. COURTESY PHOTO
The recent wide temperature changes are hard on wildlife.
Mammals cannot just take their winter coat off when temps soar into the upper 60’s and then put them back on when it plunges to the teens, like we can.
You can lend a helping hand to your neighborhood wildlife by providing extra water sources when it gets unseasonably warm and extra food when it gets bitterly cold.
Raisins, cranberries, apple slices, quartered oranges can all be put out to provide supplemental food for Mockingbirds, Orioles, Robins, Tanagers, Grosbeaks and Cardinals.
Peanut hearts and chips in a bird feeder or peanut butter spread on east facing branch or a pine cone will attract Blue Jays, White-Throated Sparrows and Nuthatches.
Woodpeckers, Nuthatches, Chickadees, Titmice, Brown Creepers and Wrens will enjoy suet. You can place the suet in plastic “cages” or spread it on other east facing branches.
It will also attract raccoons. Red and white proso millet spread on the ground will attract Mourning Doves, Rufous-Sided Towhee, Song Sparrow, Dark-Eyed Juncos, and many sparrows including the Harris Sparrow, White-Throated and White-Crowned Sparrows.
Please remember, feeding the deer is no longer allowed at Quartz Mountain State Park. Supplemental feed for the deer in the park is not necessary. There is plenty of native foods: mesquite beans, acorns, leaves, shrubs and grasses.