Spring is the season a garden's birds are working hardest: raising a brood, feeding fledglings, and doing all of it on whatever they can find nearby. A seed mix built for that stretch of the year is trying to plug a specific gap rather than just being seed in general.

This is a 12.75KG blend of sunflower hearts, pinhead oatmeal, split maize, red dari, natural groats, white millet, niger seed, jap millet, wild seeds, oyster shell grit, berry suet pellets, insect suet pellets, dried mealworm, vegetable oil and aniseed. It carries a calorific value of 457 kCals per 100g of oil, and Johnston & Jeff's stated aim is to combine high-energy ingredients with the minerals, vitamins, trace elements and proteins that support egg production, and skeletal and tissue growth in fledglings. The aniseed is included as a digestive aid, and also to attract adult birds to a feeding station and encourage fledglings to forage.

• 12.75KG bag
• Sunflower hearts, oatmeal, maize, millet, niger seed, mealworm and suet pellets
• Calorific value 457 kCal per 100g of oil
• Includes oyster shell grit for calcium
• Aniseed included as a digestive aid and to attract birds

What's not on the label. This is a wheat-containing mix, so it is not grain free, and no specific feeding rate or protein percentage is given beyond the ingredient list itself — feed it the way you would any wild bird seed, judging by what the birds actually clear rather than a fixed measure.

Who it's for: anyone feeding garden birds through the breeding season who wants a mix built for that period rather than a general year-round blend.