There are lots of bird feeders that you can choose to keep in your garden and amongst the favorites you'll find the Tube Feeders at the top of the list. These feeders work well with small wild birds like Chickadees, Titmice and Goldfinches and are shaped liked long cylinders.

They come in 2 variations. One type serves thistle seeds or nyjer seeds. The other one dispenses mixed seed varieties. For each type of seed, you'll get different bird species coming to your feeders.

The thistle seed Tube Feeders are long and thin and have lots of perches next to the numerous small slotted feeding ports. Birds like Woodpeckers, Pine Siskins and House Finches will enjoy dining at this type of feeder as well. As these bird types are relatively small they can fit easily on the small perches.

This perch size will also discourage larger birds like Grosbeaks, Cardinals, Doves, Blue Jays, Grackles and Blackbirds from coming to overeat at the Tube Feeders. You'll instead find these bird species at hopper feeders or ground feeders.

The patented Upside Down Thistle Tube Feeders are also good at discouraging unwanted bird types from feeding here. This is because the feeding ports are located under the perches. Therefore any bird who wants to eat from these Tube Feeders must be willing to cling upside down and eat. This generally discourages other birds but will readily attract Goldfinches and Pine Siskins as they are known to be quite acrobatic and don't mind feeding while hanging upside down.

For those of you who prefer serving mixed seeds or black oil sunflower seeds then you'll need to look at Tube Feeders that have feeding ports which allow for the dispensing of large seeds. Like the Thistle Tube Feeders, these feeders also have numerous perches and feeding ports. To reduce the amount of competition near feeding stations, tube feeders that have perches some distance apart are good.

Of course with the menace of squirrels around you might want to find a way of protecting your Tube Feeders from these animals. One such method is to invest in a Tube Feeder that has a wire mesh type frame or cage around the feeder. This way only small bird types will be able to feed from these enclosed Tube Feeders.

You will sometimes find Tube Feeders that come with attachments of other tubes which you can the use to create a longer Tube Feeder that will allow more birds to feed at the same time.

Whichever Tube Feeder you decide on though, remember and make sure that you'll have a clear line of sight to your feeders, half the fun of bird feeding after all lies in watching the antics of the various birds. And this is especially true of the upside down feeder - the sight of fully a dozen or so birds all hanging upside down while they feed is a sight to behold and shouldn't be missed.