Please do not put red dye in hummingbird sugar water. (birds, look)
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I try to spread this information to everybody who claims TO LOVE HUMMINGBIRDS but there are still stores which still sell the "hummingbird food" and encourage patrons to buy it.
All good scientists are skeptics. I just looked up "iron in brown sugar"-- 1.6 mg per 220,000 mg (1 cup) sugar. Even allowing for hepatic accumulation and the theoretically possible pathology (hemosiderosis) that could ensue, I have to wonder about the actual risk of this occurring in vivo.
[for comparison, in humans, each ml of blood contains ~1.5mg of Fe; let's say a hummingbird is similar and has 5 cc of blood, then it would have to drink 5 feeder-fulls of food made with 1 cup of brown sugar/4 cups water to replace it's blood Fe supply.]
Searching for papers on hemosiderosis in hummingbrds, I found none in the first five pages of references listing hemosiderosis, but did come across this "Fact Check" from Snopes https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/dye-cast/
Apparently there is no evidence whatsoever that food coloring has any deleterious effect.
As the Snopes piece states, you don't need the dye, but it probably isn't doing any harm either.
I try to spread this information to everybody who claims TO LOVE HUMMINGBIRDS but there are still stores which still sell the "hummingbird food" and encourage patrons to buy it.
We have a half dozen double or quadruple Shepherd Hook poles for bird feeders, including two hummingbird feeders and 4 or 5 hanging flower baskets on them. Hummingbirds (& bees & butterflies) regularly make the rounds of the flowers, spending several minutes at a time there, but only occasionally take a quick lick at the feeders. (Maybe the wife is a bad cook?) Feeders probably don't form a large part of the hummingbirds' diet, and if you're making your own sugar solution, why bother with the dye?
I would never put dye in their feeders, because I myself wouldn't want to drink red dye all day long. Doesn't matter if someone says it is harmful, and someone else says it isn't harmful; I'd never do it either way.
Plus, it is absolutely not necessary to put dye in their feeders.
I would never put dye in their feeders, because I myself wouldn't want to drink red dye all day long. Doesn't matter if someone says it is harmful, and someone else says it isn't harmful; I'd never do it either way.
Plus, it is absolutely not necessary to put dye in their feeders.
If the red dye is used, when they poop, they leave little red spots all over your patio furniture. It is impossible to clean it! So, that is a reason not to use the dye, even if it does not cause the birds harm.
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