Droll Yankees® B-Series Caged Squirrel-Proof Bird Feeder - 2.5 lb

Three stars for this feeder because so many little birds love it, especially goldfinches, who feed from it from sunrise to sunset. I fill the feeder exclusively with sunflower hearts. I deducted one star because the feeder is unnecessarily difficult and frustrating to clean. Droll Yankee keeps raising the price of this feeder - I bought it in 2021 for $88 - but does not appear to have worked on the design to make it any easier to clean. I deducted a second star because the clear plastic dome cracked and pieces broke off, and I have not been successful in purchasing a replacement dome from the company. It seems to be perpetually out of stock.

This feeder looked very promising, but after the chickadees and titmice carried away the seeds at the openings, no more seed dropped down. The rest of the seeds simply stayed put. I used a chopstick to push the seed around inside the tube but had the same results: Some seeds drop down into the openings, get cleaned out by the birds, and the rest of the seed stays stuck in the tube. I am using a very clean "patio mix" with mostly shelled sunflower seeds. If the situation doesn't improve, I'm going to have to give the feeder no stars.

in keeping with the Droll Yankee product line, this feederis well made with quality materials. BUT to say this unit is easy to clean is, in myexperience, ridiculous! to disassemble this unit for proper cleaning is so complicated it discourages one of the necessary steps in attracting birds, and keeping them healthy, CLEANING! how many small nuts are lost, removing the feeding ports? i have lost two of three already. to remove the 'bottom' plastic dispersing plate (mydescriptive term) you have to remove the two perch rods above it AND the rod tha the tube lid is secured to (which involves unbending and then re-bending the 'hanging' wire. surely the Droll design team can come up with a better system for cleaning an otherwise first rate feeder. i'd ask for my money back, but realize that is probably a nonstarter. my advice, if you are conscientious about keeping your feeder clean, shop around. in the future i know i will! Mike Dyer, Blue Hill, Maine a somewhat less enthusiastic Droll customer

I wish I had seen these reviews before purchasing this dome-topped caged feeder. I can not emphasize just how difficult and time-consuming it is to clean. Just to remove the baffle, either you must take apart all the perches and pull the baffle down and off the bottom of the tube feeder or to pull it off the top of the tube, you must bend the bail wire to lift it off to clean. For a company who pushes cleaning your feeders (as they should), this design truly discourages it.

I really like this caged feeder, as it adds one to my mix that excludes the larger birds and squirrels, giving the smaller songbirds more chance to feed. But I hate cleaning this one. All my others are ring-pull designs, and I wish this one was as well. Droll Yankees offered a cage as an accessory for the A-6 feeders for a short time, but I didn't buy one when I had the chance. Now I wish I had. Having to use a tool for assembly/disassembly, fidgeting with small screws that are easy to drop or lose, etc., is all an unnecessary pain when the A-6 ring-pull design is so good, fast, and easy.

Blackbirds can't get in Finches are enjoying the feeder

Good quality. Ridiculously hard to disassemble. I settled on leaving the perch bars and cap on and used the jet setting on the garden hose to clean. I had to drench the awkward feeder in bleach solution by hand to properly disinfect. I couldn’t get the perch bars out and did not want to use the force necessary to free them. I returned another company’s similar feeder because I couldn’t disassemble it and bought this one because I was “sure” DY feeders could be properly disassembled and cleaned. It shouldn’t take so much effort.

High quality bird feeder that could use improvements to become a terrific contender. The quality of the materials, its construction and its high seed capacity make this feeder worth considering. The black cage is a general deterrent to small birds and they take a good while to begin to explore the seed being offered. However, once the cage is removed, they flock to the feeder. I wonder if a red or yellow cage would encourage better participation? The cage is a deterrent to gray and black squirrels but not red squirrels or chipmunks, which negates its usefulness, IMO. However, the large sheltering dome and small, slippery aluminum perches combine to thoroughly discourage all the varmints on my property from pillaging seed once the cage is removed! In fact, larger birds find it too difficult to feed. Removal of the cage reduces the weight of the unit, which is weighty when full of seed with the cage on, improve balance on feeder stand. Furthermore, my wife very much likes its looks without the cage, a development not to be ignored. Cageless, this feeder has become a small bird favorite that is immune to raids by mammals and large birds. I would recommend that Droll Yankees consider producing this feeder without a cage and adding a few improvements. There is a sturdy wire spring clamp that prevents the sheltering dome from rising too high. Another one of these below the dome would prevent its untimely decent. There are two places unwanted seed collects, at the perches and at the bottom of the tube. The aluminum perches do not have the same internal radius as the seed tube, resulting in gaps that collect seed and mold. I used plumber’s putty to fill each gap with good results. The angled plastic piece at the very bottom of the seed tube, which acts as its floor, allows some seed to slide down below it, making cleaning more of a chore than it ought to be. A water jet from a garden hose reduces cleaning drudgery quite a bit, I might add. With a substantial reduction in price, this feeder with the above recommended changes would take top honors, IMO.

Not sure what stars I can give as I just got this a few days ago. Unfortunately not a single bird will venture in to try it. I just saw a sparrow though jump inside and then straight out. Does it take a while for the little birds to feel safe entering through the cage?

Best squirrel proof feeder we have found. They climb, they stick their little paws in and their head in but htey can't reach the food. The smaller birds figured it out pretty easy, but it took the cardinals a few weeks to become really accustomed to it. 2 months into it and so far so good.