Polish city opens free bird-feed dispensers to discourage giving ducks bread

With the first snow of the season beginning to fall, Kraków has announced the return of dispensers offering free bird feed for the public to give to ducks and other waterfowl.

The initiative, which is run by a number of towns and cities in Poland, is part of efforts to discourage feeding the birds with bread, which is unhealthy for the animals.

The authorities announced today that they have installed the devices at five municipal parks and reservoirs. They are officially called “duck buffets” (kaczy bufet) but the unofficial name is kaczkomat, a play on words adding kaczka (duck) to paczkomat, the widely used name for parcel-delivery lockers.

“The machines dispense food free of charge four times an hour, to avoid overfeeding and food waste,” announced the city. “Thanks to this, ducks receive food that is suitable for them – with vitamins and microelements. Remember that dry bread is not a good idea for feeding ducks!”

The Municipal Greenery Board (ZZM) notes that bread does not provide ducks with useful nutrients and that it can in fact cause them health problems by acidifying their digestive system and giving them too much salt.

The authorities also note that feeding ducks is only necessary when temperatures drop and snow begins to appear. When conditions are more favourable, they have no problems finding their own food.

“Under no circumstances should we throw food into the water,” they add. “This poses a threat to the ecosystem, and water-soaked food harms birds.”

Similar initiatives have been undertaken in a number of other towns and cities around Poland, with the first such dispensers appearing in the capital, Warsaw, in 2017, according to local news service Nasze Miasto.

In Łódź, like in Kraków, the devices have been installed as part of the so-called “citizen’s budget”, which allows local residents to choose certain projects that receive municipal funding.

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Main image credit: ZZM Kraków

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.