It’s not as easy as it sounds

You’d think by now I’d know what I want., I do. The problem isn’t a failure to know what I want, but an absence of what I want available.

Because I hang a lot of feeders, I try to use a variety to serve a varied population. Some feeders only useful for small birds — finches, chickadees, titmouses and other small garden birds. Other feeders have bigger perches, fine for Blue Jays, crows, starling and other medium to large garden birds. The flat ones are the favorite of doves and squirrels.

Almost every feeder now claims to be squirrel-proof. NOTHING can keep a determined squirrel out of a feeder. They are born determinedly food-driven. If there is food, squirrels will find a way to get it. In any case, I don’t necessarily want to prevent squirrels from eating. I wish I could limit how much they eat, but they deserve a good meal. I almost bought a squirrel proof feeder just to watch the gymnastics they’d perform to figure out how to get into it, but it seemed a waste of money. I don’t like the “squirrel-proof” designs. Too complicated and hard to clean. I try to keep the squirrels from eating more than I can afford, but they deserve to be part of the buffet.

The other issue is feeder design — how food is put into the feeder and how to clean it. Some of the nicest and most beautiful feeders are made of cedar and are often handmade. They are wonderful for the birds and the squirrels but are heavy. They weigh as much as 10 pounds without seeds. Add pounds of seeds and I can’t lift them. Huge feeders invite flying squirrels to feast and offer raccoons a chance to grab a whole feeder, enough food for the whole famdamily. I love the flying squirrels, but can’t afford them. The.flyers can empty ten pounds of seed in four hours.

I want feeders that will hold 2 or 3 pounds of seed, be easy to fill and clean. What else?

I don’t like hard plastic feeders. Not only is it another way to add more plastic to our world, but birds and squirrels like to perch. Hard plastic isn’t perchible. I want a feeder to have ports so birds can poke their little heads into the feeder easily. Many of the “squirrel-proof” feeders have ports are so deep, many of the small birds would have trouble getting to the food.

So medium sized, easy to fill and clean and simple for the birds to use — and it has to be wire mesh, not hard plastic. It also has to use a wire for hanging the lid doesn’t fall off when you are trying to fill it.

I want a overed feeder to protect them from rain and snow. The only non-roofed feeder I have is a big flat feeder. I’ve taken it down for now to give the doves and squirrels time to make peace. Overall, in the endless battle for ownership of the flat feeder, it’s usually a 50-50 fight but a phalanx of tough little red squirrels can usually convince the doves to hover in a tree until the squirrels finish eating, Which is usually when the feeder is empty.

Oddly enough, color matters, The birds like yellow, green, and brown. The do NOT like red or bright blue. Especially red. They will avoid eating from a red feeder. Birds are visual. They have definite preferences about color. They also can see more colors than we can. Maybe the red paint bothers them? I’ve heard from others that their birds won’t eat out of red feeders.

So what did I get? I got another one of the yellow feeders. They last three to four years, depending on the weather. I replace them when the paint starts to peel. The wires wear out, but my son replaces the wires with better wires. Peeling paint is more worrisome. I don’t want anything eating paint chips.

It took me almost all day to finally buy another yellow feeder and two small, inexpensive feeders that probably won’t last through the summer. Having spare feeders is not a bad idea. Feeders fall off hooks — especially when helped by raccoons or clever squirrels. Some get stolen by ambitious raccoons. I still don’t know how they get those big feeders over the fence, but maybe they have a secret hail mary pass they use to fling it over the back fence. I wish I’d caught it on camera!

Categories: #Birds, #gallery, #Photography, Anecdote

Tags: #Gallery, #Photography, birds, Marilyn Armstrong