At this time of year when temperatures remain cold, foraging time for farmland birds is at its lowest as natural food sources start to deplete. This period is often referred to as the ‘hungry gap’ and typically lasts through to April, therefore making the coming weeks really important for supplementary feeding – even more so if you recently accepted an extension to your Countryside Stewardship Mid Tier agreement.

Countryside Stewardship Mid Tier Extension

Late last year, the Rural Payments Agency (RPA) offered growers with Countryside Stewardship Mid Tier agreements ending 31st December 2025 a one-year extension. If you were invited to do this and have recently accepted, you need to make sure that you are still fulfilling your option requirements until your new agreement’s end date, which will be 31st December 2026.

If your agreement includes AB12 Supplementary Feeding and you are going to claim this on your annual claim form this spring, you need to make sure you are feeding until the end of April this year.

Help is available if you need additional seed

If you have extended your Mid Tier agreement, we understand that you’ll have new requirements for supplementary seed to ensure you can continue feeding within your new scheme timelines.

To help, we’re offering a 5% discount on supplementary seed orders running until 1st April 2026 (applicable to seed products only) so you can be sure you have everything you need to meet your continued AB12 action.

For more information, speak to your local Frontier representative or get in touch.

Seed composition and quality

The composition of your supplementary feeding mix is important as it needs to provide a variety of seed types that appeal to a wide range of birds.

A typical mix will have up to 70% cereal (not maize), with the rest being a mixture of at least three small seeds. No single small seed can make up more than 50% of this element. The most commonly used are oilseed rape, millet, sunflower, canary and linseed. All of these are highly attractive to farmland birds and provide a rich source of energy in the winter months when other food sources are less available.

The purity of the seed is important too, particularly as it’s often spread thinly at various locations around the farm and if not of sound quality it could potentially introduce undesirable species like black-grass, rogue millets and fat hen.

At Frontier we take seed quality seriously, priding ourselves on a standard above the industry minimum. You learn more about the work we do to ensure the highest quality seed in this blog from national technical manager for seed, Kirsty Richards.

Once you’ve received your seed, our advisors can provide ongoing support with the management of your wild bird seed crops and feeding regime during the key supplementary window. You can also find some best practice guidance below:

Top tips

• The rules around how you should deliver supplementary feed aren’t strict, but you should have at least one feeding site per 500kg of feed used and not be feeding more than 10% of it through hoppers and feeders. If you are using feeders, our environmental crops team can supply both standard and automatic feeders from Perdix, which can be moved around easily to help with the rotation of supplementary feeding locations.

• Some growers choose to spread the seed manually, but most use spinners. If possible, try to use hard tracks to spread seed and try to feed adjacent to any winter bird food plots you have (AB9/AHL2/CAHL2), as farmland birds will already be concentrated here.

• Having a hedge next to the feeding track is useful as birds will feel more secure if there is a nearby cover to dive into should a predator be close by. If you’re interested in establishing a hedge row, particularly as part of the Capital Grant scheme, you can find out more in this blog on the topic. Try to avoid feeding close to farm buildings to minimize the risk of pests becoming a problem.

• If there is a shoot on the farm, you are probably already providing food (such as wheat or kibbled maize) for the game birds. Adapting the mix to contain cereals and small seeds is easily done to provide for other species while still catering them.

Record keeping

We supply supplementary feeding record books to help you remain compliant.

The record book can be used across the year to support your ongoing feeding activity. It’s also worth using digital recording tools to help evidence your hard work electronically. Our environment manager tool is available in Frontier’s MyFarm platform and can be used to map your feeding sites, keep track of progress, save photos and keep accurate records and timelines all in one place. You can learn more here.

Another great way to see the fruits of your labour and record the impact of any supplementary feeding is to get involved in the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust’s Big Farmland Bird Count. The count is already underway but doesn’t finish until 22nd February, so there’s still time to join in! Previous years have seen amazing results and the number of participants continues to grow – visit the BFBC website to see how you can take part.

Whether the driver for supplementary feeding on your farm is environmental, economic or a combination of the two, your efforts will provide farmland birds with everything they need to get through those difficult winter months.

For support with your supplementary feeding activity, agri-environment scheme requirements, or seed needs, please speak to your Frontier advisor or get in touch by emailing info@frontierag.co.uk or calling 0800 227 445.