A roll or just crumbs may be on it for the birds (5)
I believe the answer is:
table
'a roll' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'it for the birds' is the wordplay.
'it' becomes 't' (abbreviation. e.g. in 'tis).
'for' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
'the birds' becomes 'able' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
't'+'able'='TABLE'
'or just crumbs may be on' acts as a link.
This may not be correct. Some or all of it may belong to another bit of the clue.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for table that I've seen before include "Food; flat gem surface" , "Array of data" , "Set of figures in columns" , "Board for meals" , "put forward for consideration" .)