Gardeners urged to leave crushed eggshells on bird tables throughout March

Feeding birds in spring doesn’t have to be expensive, as leftover eggshells are rich in calcium and can help female birds lay strong eggs and give chicks the best chance of survival

Supporting our feathered friends needn’t break the bank, as numerous kitchen scraps can prove invaluable – which is precisely why gardeners are being urged to put out eggshells.

Maureen Eiger, director of Help Wild Birds, has revealed that eggshells boast impressive calcium levels, making them particularly beneficial for birds during spring when they’re producing eggs.

She explained: “We throw eggshells in the garbage almost every day, but they are full of calcium and minerals. Birds need additional calcium, especially after nesting season.”

Birds’ nutritional requirements shift with the seasons – throughout winter, they generally require high-fat foods to stockpile energy reserves for staying warm. Come spring, female birds particularly benefit from crushed eggshells due to their calcium-rich composition, which supports the production of robust eggs that hatch successfully and provides hatchlings with the strongest start in life.

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That said, you can’t simply scatter eggshells onto a bird table, as uncooked eggs harbour bacteria such as salmonella, which poses risks to birds and enables disease transmission to their offspring.

A better approach involves spending 10 minutes baking the eggshells in your oven first, as this process eliminates harmful bacteria and sterilises them properly, reports the Express.

How to prepare crushed eggshells for birds

Simply store empty eggshells in their carton as you use eggs for cooking, and once you’ve filled the carton, give the shells a quick rinse under running water. Raw egg yolk can harbour bacteria and potentially lure pests such as rats into your garden, so it’s best to rinse it out with hot water.

However, avoid using soap as this could be harmful to birds. Next, arrange the eggshells on a tray and pop them in the oven. Bake at 120C for approximately 10 minutes, then allow them to cool down.

Once cooled, the eggshells should feel extremely brittle. You can then crush them into tiny, gritty fragments until they resemble coarse sand or gravel. Avoid scattering large eggshell pieces in your garden as these are difficult for birds to handle and pose a choking hazard.

There’s also a risk that birds might start associating eggs with food and begin raiding other nests, so it’s safer for local wildlife if you feed them eggshells in small chunks.

Finally, simply scatter the crushed eggshells on a bird table or around your garden – this will provide fledgling chicks with a fantastic head start in life.

This practice is particularly beneficial for blue tits, sparrows, blackbirds, chaffinches and robins during springtime, so expect to see plenty of these feathered friends flitting about your garden come March if you make a habit of leaving out eggshells.