Black-capped Chickadees are spritely, energetic birds, and with their sweet songs, bold personalities, and hearty appetite for insects, they’re always welcome visitors. But how do you get them to visit?
Learn how to attract these chickadees to your yard with tips to meet their needs and pique their curiosity.
What Black-Capped Chickadees Need
In order to effectively attract Black-capped Chickadees, you must meet their basic needs for food, water, shelter, and nesting sites. While these birds do have some specialized needs, they don’t tend to be too fussy about how those needs are met, and it’s easy to make your yard chickadee-friendly.
Food
These small birds have big appetites. Insects are a key chickadee menu item, and they also sample berries and snack on seeds and nuts. To offer all these foods in your yard, minimize insecticide use so chickadees can enjoy the bug buffet. Plant native berry bushes for a sweet treat and add some sunflowers with big heads for these little birds to cling to as they pluck out the seeds. Planting oaks or hickory trees is a long-term goal to provide natural nuts, or you can offer whole peanuts or peanut hearts at feeders. Black-capped Chickadees will also readily visit feeders for whole or shelled sunflower seeds, raisins, and suet, and they will even snack on suet or peanut butter smeared directly on tree trunks for fast and easy access.
See also: 10 Best Foods for Bird Feeding
Water
Clean, fresh water is essential for Black-capped Chickadees, who will visit water sources to drink and bathe. Since these are tiny birds, baths should be shallow to permit safe access or include a branch angled into the deeper basin to allow the birds to get closer to the water without difficulty. These birds also stay in their range year-round, which means a heated birdbath is a good idea to provide a liquid winter water source.
See also: 10 Best Foods for Bird Feeding
Shelter
Shelter helps keep birds safe from predators and poor weather, and chickadees prefer to hide in dense, mature evergreen and deciduous trees and shrubby, thicket-like areas. Creating tiers of plantings in the yard can give Black-capped Chickadees comfortable shelter, but if plants aren’t quite big enough, a brush pile can be a good alternative. These birds will also take advantage of nesting pockets and roost boxes, especially in winter when they may spend the night cuddled together in small groups to share body warmth.
Nesting Sites
Black-capped Chickadees are cavity-nesting birds. Leaving old, hollow trees available for their nesting needs is a great way to attract chickadee families, and they will also reuse old woodpecker holes as their new residences. Small- or medium-sized birdhouses can also tempt chickadees to move in, so long as the entrance hole is roughly 1-1/8 inch in diameter. Adding some wood shavings inside the house can make it more attractive to these birds, and chickadees also love to use pet fur as nesting material. Just be sure the fur hasn’t been flea-treated, as dense concentrations of those chemicals are highly toxic for nesting birds.
From Wikimedia Commons by Alain Wolf – CC BY-SA 3.0
Bonus Tips to Attract Black-Capped Chickadees
Even with the tastiest food, cleanest water, most comfortable shelter, and safest nesting sites, it might be a little while before Black-capped Chickadees become regular backyard guests. However, there are certain tricks that can invite them to visit sooner:
Catch Their Attention
These are curious and attentive birds, and they are very likely to investigate unusual sights or sounds. Splashing noises from a fountain or dripper can attract chickadees, or glittering yard accents such as a faceted bird feeder or crackled gazing ball will easily attract chickadees.
Pish with Passion
Black-capped Chickadees respond to pishing—those little kissy-smoochy noises or squeaks you can make to bring small birds closer for a better view. Try pishing when you are refilling bird feeders or cleaning bird baths, and you’ll be alerting chickadees that it is time to visit.
Never heard of pishing? Get up to speed on your birding lingo with our Dictionary of Birding Slang Terms!
Create a Crowd
Chickadees are social birds, particularly in winter when they flock with kinglets, wrens, titmice, and nuthatches. Taking steps to attract these other birds to an overall bird-friendly yard will generate more activity that will make chickadees notice the new, popular hangout.
Say No to Bullying
While chickadees don’t mind flocks of small birds, larger birds such as sparrows, grackles, pigeons, and starlings can be intimidating and may keep them away. Take steps to discourage these backyard bullies so chickadees can feel more comfortable when they visit.
See also: How to Stop Bully Birds from Raiding Your Feeders
Provide Lookout Perches
These birds are naturally wary and prefer a good place to watch for predators and competition. Providing perches will give them plenty of places to stick around. They will also use perches to feed as they snatch one seed or nut at a time and retreat to a safe space to crack it open.
Black-capped Chickadees are amazing guests, always entertaining with their acrobatic antics, crisp plumage, and larger-than-life attitudes. By meeting their needs and matching their personalities, you can easily attract these birds to your yard.
