No grow ground mix

3.0 out of 5

37

I'm surprised to see bad reviews for this as this si definitely the best mix I've bought. I use it in a typical feeder and the birds love it and most importantly finally i don't have grass growing underneath ! Have bought several bags , highly recommend

Orders from RSPB always arrive promptly. The birds love the food we have everything from moorhens to wrens to rooks in the garden and there is never a morsel left. All our feeders are covered from the rain, floor and table feeder have roofs. I have ordered many times and felt a review was necessary as I really haven’t had a bad experience.

Very disappointed with this large sack. If the ground is any way wet, which often is at this time of year, the mix becomes gloopy and sludgy. Birds not keen on it.

I've very sorry to have to say that I was very unpleasantly surprised with this mix. It was so full of "dust" that I really wonder if we got a sack that was the sweepings up at the end of a batch, Any dampness in the air meant it went soggy at once. I had great hopes for the "non-grow" mix but don't think I will ever buy it again, if all the sacks have this much dust in them. Needs sieving before selling! Honestly it does.

Big bag of a mixture of dusty old scraps and what looks like broken cornflakes.
Tried it in three locations during the recent cold snap. Even the ever present wood pigeons turned their noses up.
Stayed on the ground uneaten for days. In the end I’ve had to brush it up and consigned it to the bin.
Worst I’ve ever bought.

Yes its cheap for the quantity but it sticks in the RSPB feeders I use because the 'corn flakes' ( or whatever they are) cause jamming - so the birds get frustrated and go elsewhere. I'm sorry that I bought a big sack, I won't buy it again unless you find a mix that doesn't jam; you should mention this in the selling notes..

Very popular with my ground feeding birds. The Robins are there immediately I refill my ground feeder in the morning. No problem with dust, so far.

I first bought a small bag of this to try it out. It went down well so I went all in with a large bag. I wish I hadn't! I was disappointed to see that this contained a large proportion of 'dust'. I use a mesh ground feeder and beneath it is left a puddle of fluff (that turns into a sticky mushy mess when it rains) that nobody wants to eat and I have to clean up. I will switch to another mix next time!

My birds are loving this at the moment! I have a lot of sparrows and starlings with their babies, and this stuff just goes so fast! But, what are the pink bits? Cos they like them the most!

Awful, the birds don’t like it, the maize is a disaster even the pigeons won’t eat it

I've been putting out the No Grow Ground Mix for several years. It always disappears.
Yes, there's dust at the bottom of the bag, but that is to be expected. I actually create my own mix, so I use this feed along with peanut kibbles, and buggy nibbles.
The robin, blue tits, great tits, blackbirds, starlings that visit my garden all say 'thank you'!

2 years ago you changed the mix - took out the raisins and put in minced suet - backward/negative progress - more profit?

I agree with the other reviews that the cornflakes are not popular and are left uneaten. Instead of saying that they "eventually" get eaten, why not just exclude them altogether and replace them with the popular items ??

I found I couldnt keep up with th sppe this foo was eaten by the birds. All the items including flakes were eaten. I have a RSPB 'cage' to keep out the lrger birds, pigeons etc, but unfortunately not squirrels. I feed several times a day, and at times I hve hardly got back into the house before the birds are feeding again. Just ordered a large bag of this mix. I hae robins, blue tits, sparrows, male and female blackbirds, starlings ( of course) even a golfinch has visited. The 'menu' seems very popular.. I do not have a massive garden, and am surrounded by other houses, some of whom feed the birds. It is my contribution to conservation. That an a nightly visited from a hedgehog, which I also feed with recommended food and water.

THis used to be the birds' favourite (and mine too for a "No Grow" mix), but the flaked maize has got much too large and chunky...birds fish it out and ignore it...only the woodpigeons like it. Please reduce the size of flakes, or better still take it out altogether. Can't recommend until fault rectified.

I have to agree with other reviewers, the flaked maize is ignored by ALL the birds visiting my garden. I have a guardian cage over the ground feeder so that the larger birds can't get at the food and every day I have to empty the unwanted flakes onto a corner of the garden where they are eventually eaten by pigeons, crows and jackdaws. We have many blackbirds and they all, without exception, refuse to eat the flakes - even in the cold weather. It's a bit of a waste. The rest of the mix is good and is always completely eaten during the day. I continue to buy it because of the 'no grow' character.

LIke some other customers I find that the yellow flakes are igniored by all birds except pigeons.

I originally bought a sack of this food in the summer and it wasn’t as popular with the birds as the traditional seed mixes, however during the winter it has been very popular with the birds, particularly the thrushes and blackbirds. The squirrels like it too. In my latest sack, I did find a quite well decomposed mouse, which had obviously got in in the warehouse, close to the top of the sack but I haven’t had any problems with rspb food sacks before.

I’m really sorry to say I’m rather disappointed with this. There are a lot of large flakes in it which only the pidgins seem to like. Also as others have pointed out, there’s quite a lot of dust as well. My garden birds definitely prefer the other mixed seed variety which goes down much quicker than this one. I’ll buy the other variety in future.

I have purchased this before and it wasn’t too bad but the last delivery had far too much of the yellow flakes, so much so that I had to sieve each time I fed the birds. The only birds to eat the flakes were the pigeons who are not welcomed in my garden.

Have bought this mix from you for many years and am purchasing more today, as during the great Garden Bird Watch weekend much was consumed.

I am surprised to see the poor reviews of this mix. When I put it out, it is never there long enough to go soggy as the blackbirds, robins and other birds are down there straight away eating it up.
During the snow and hard frosts, when other food was hard to find, half a dozen blackbirds would actually mob me when I came out the house, knowing that I was about to give them some food. The blackbirds are normally quite shy, but they would stand inches away from me as I put the food out for them.

RSPB response: Thank you for your lovely review, it's great to hear how much your birds enjoy this mix.

I purchased this product for first time this week,but was very disappointed with it as consisted of a lot of dust. As it is similar to favourites blend which is a great favourite I thought I'd try it. I have one of the ground feeder trays and a lo5 fell through . Will not buy again.

RSPB response: Thank you for your review, sorry to hear you got a bag with too much dust. We did have some issues with this product and the amount of dust it had in packs. We have now amended the mix so that we don't have excess dust.

As soon as I put this food out the birds quickly cleared it up.As there are so many cats nearby I keep the tray in a RSPB cage.Sparrows,dunnocks, goldfinch 's and the robin are the most regular visitors.Blackbirds can get into the cage but are wary of it.The downside to this food is when it rains.After a while a lot of the food turns into a sloppy mess and the tray needs cleaned immediately.

RSPB response: Thank you for your review, its great to hear how pleased you and your birds are with this product! We now sell a ground feeding table with a roof which can provide some protection to the food from rain!

This mix is very poor, a high proportion of wheat ,which none of the birds eat ,not even the pigeons!
No grow is not true ,the wheat grows very well!!!!!

RSPB response: Thank you for your review. I am shocked to read this as we do not put wheat in our No Grow Ground Mix. The only mix we have that contains wheat is our Table Mix, which is included for Doves and Pigeons, however it certainly isn't a high proportion. Please can you get in contact with our customer service team with the batch number of your bag and to supply a sample, so we can look into this urgently for you with our supplier.

I have 11 feeders and a ground feeder i have had this new feed for ages and it just sits there unlike the old product the blackbirds simply dont like it

RSPB response: Thank you for your review, I am sorry to hear you are unhappy with this mix. We do advise to persevere when putting out new bird food, as it can take quite a while for birds to approach and try it.

Disappointed with this mix, it contains a high proportion of wheat which is never eaten by any of the visiting birds. I feed in a cage to prevent pigeons eating everything ,I know they would eat it but we would be inundated with them!
I usually read what seed mixes contain and always avoid any with wheat but this isn't possible on this site.
There's nothing like the amount of pink pellets shown on the picture either !
I definitely won't be buying it again.

RSPB response: Thank you for your review, I am sorry to hear about the mix you received. Please can you contact our customer service team with the batch number on your bag of seed so we can investigate this with our supplier.

I decided to try this in the hanging feeder because I noticed the tits were chucking the sunflower hearts out of the Favourites Blend Bird Food and eating the sprinkles and mealworms. I left this No Grow Ground Mix in the feeder for a few days but it was proving not popular with the smaller birds that like the hanging feeders, so I reverted back to the Favourites Blend and it is being eaten much quicker. I am throwing the No Grow Ground Mix on the ground and now we have 30+ Collared doves plus jackdaws, magpies, wood pigeons, rock doves and this week the noisy parakeets have started arriving at the banquet. It's going down quickly so I need to re-order.

I have so many birds and the blackbirds liked the old mix they hate this and it sits there for days

RSPB response: Thank you for your review, I am sorry that you are unhappy with this mix. We do advise that it can take some time for birds to adjust to new food, as they are very cautious creatures.

Much as I generally love the seed mixes and suet available from the RSPB, this one is nothing like the photograph. I ordered two 12.75kg sacks. Having opened one, and churned through it to try to find any of the red suet nibbles, I can't find a single one. The mix is (a visual estimate) 95% sunflowers with the rest rolled oats and corn (if I've got the last one right) but I'm yet to find anything red or made of suet. Please, please RSPB get your supplier to improve their quality checks.

RSPB response: Thank you for your review, I am sorry you are unhappy with this mix. Please can you contact customer services with the batch number and any photos of the mix you received so we can raise this with our supplier.

This does not do what it says on the bag, ""no grow"" does not apply. I note that you say that the feed is tested for gemination, I would suggest that the testing is reviewed, as I now have sprouting seeds all over the garden, and as Birdie said, there is a lot of dust. I had previously bought Premium Ground Mix and find this a very poor replacement, and will not be buying it again.

RSPB response: Thank you for your review. In order to investigate please would you kindly contact customer services with the batch number and any photos of growth so we can look into this with our supplier. After previous comments regarding the level of dust we have recently improved the mix to reduce the level of dust.

I was pleased to see that there were no more raisins. They tended to get left over, especially from spring onwards and towards the end of summer the bird table was full of wasps drawn by the raisins. However, it does get a bit mushier than the old one I think but not enough to give it an excellent rating. I do complement it with sprinkles and dried worms.

RSPB response: Thank you for the review and we are pleased you are happy with the new mix. We will look into the fact it gets a bit mushier than the old and try and improve the mix further.

I agree with Birdie about regretting the withdrawal of the premium ground mix which although expensive, I bought a lot of. Unlike reviewers who rated that, the blackbirds and red squirrels loved the raisins, and if I was lucky enough to have had a song thrush here, as I had in my previous garden, they would have done also, so was sorry to see there are none in here, and can only assume they were too expensive to add, even though this is no cheaper than that mix. This is still very popular, with absolutely no waste, but does go mushy if it gets wet, as did the premium ground mix.. I also agree I couldn't afford to keep up with the demand for suet pellets so nice to see tiny bits in here. I would say though, the illustration makes them appear larger than they are. I will be buyingm ore of this.

So surprised to read a negative review as I find this food brilliant! It's popular with all my birds and never a scrap left.
The combination makes it an all rounder and it's good value for money.
I do find that the birds are initially suspicious of a new food so may take a couple of days to accept....

I read the negative review and had to put things right! This food is excellent, I'm on my second bag. It's a brilliant all-rounder popular with all our garden birds. I couldn't afford to buy suet nibbles at the rate they are consumed so this food rations it out and includes all the other favourites. Will continue to feed it through winter...

Purchased this recently. My birds do NOT like it.Food left over each day,even the pigeons wont touch it ! .Also very 'dusty'. A shame previous mix has been discontinued. One wonders if any field trials are carried out before new products are released.

RSPB response: Thank you for your review, we are sorry that you are not happy with the No Grow Ground Mix and that you have found it to be very dusty, which should not be the case. We have fed these comments back to the supplier and are looking into this. We do test all new bird foods and found that birds enjoyed this mix and that seeds did not germinate. Please contact customer services who will be able to help

I bought this mix as trying to find an economic alternative to the ever popular sprinkles and wanted to find a mix where there's no wastage. This mix fits the bill perfectly. We have a massive population of sparrows but also many other birds such as blackbirds, doves, tits, starlings and even the nuthatch visited this morning. This food seems to suit them all.