Bird Feeders

Throughout the year we put out food for the birds on our bird tables and ensure there is water in the bird bath for the birds too. With food becoming scarcer for them during the colder months we put out more food for the birds. Apart from putting out the usual bird seed mix and nuts, there are so many ways to have fun making all sorts of bird feeders.
Pinecones can be stuff with fat (like lard, vegetable margarine. Avoid peanut butter though as it is high in salt) and birdseed mix and hung from string from a branch. Toilet paper rolls can be rolled in the fat/birdseed mix too and hung up. Drill holes in a smallish piece of wood and stuff with bird food mix and hang this up. Clay flower pots can be stuffed and hung upside down using string and a twig to serve as a perch.
This week we have made bird cake - lard and bird seed and nuts - also rosehips, hawthornes and oat seed, we have gathered on our walks to provide the birds with food they would usually find in their natural environment.
We halved pumpkin shells and made these into bird feeders. Our decorated pumpkins were 'recycled' into bird feeders after the halloween season had passed too. Orange, grapefruit, and melon skins work well. We use a coconut shell kept from summer. We have also put out two lovely big dried out sunflower heads from our summer garden full of delicous seeds and we enjoy threading nuts onto string. Plastic containers can be fashioned into great bird feeders too.

We have been admiring all the beautiful species of birds visiting our feeders and birdtables. We were amazed to notice a woodpecker in our garden recently. Amongst our regular visitors which include tits, sparrows and pied wagtails, we have a pair of doves who nest in one of our garden trees. We have been watching them since the spring and greatly enjoy their presence.