Good seed
Feeder news
Readers of my old blog will know that I maintain a network of bird feeders in the back garden. I buy my seed, premium sunflower hearts, in bulk from these nice people (see how easily I fall into the trap of imagining that because a company sells good things they must be nice people! God bless me). Once a month I order four 10kg sacks of the stuff, with a stock-up of peanuts when needed. (I have two wire-mesh peanut feeders, which go down much less quickly than the four Conqueror seed feeders in die-cast powder-coated zinc and strong polycarbonate tubing: two medium, with 10 ports, and one large, with 12 ports.) Because the seed people deliver two working days after you order, I fucked up this time and ordered my usual 40kg on Friday. The shipment arrived too late yesterday for me to go out and replenish, so I did it this morning. In the interim, all three seed feeders had run down to the bottom. I felt bad, as all my lovely birds - blue tits, coal tits, great tits, greenfinches, goldfinches, chaffinches, nuthatches and robin - were coming down and finding the cupboards bare. It was cold and wet when I went out in my wellies to fill them up this morning, so that was my penance for letting the birds down.
All feeders are now filled to the brim and I promise I won't go on about this any more, but the reward always comes when I am mid-replenish. A blue tit will perch at the top of the apple tree with me working underneath and call out to the other birds. I imagine he is saying, "At last! The man is topping them up! Come on down!" The bravest ones don't even wait until I've finished before flying down and tucking in. This is my Francis of Assissi moment.
Proof that the seed people are nice: I keep the bulk seed in 10kg plastic tubs in my delapidated shed, and the delivery man doesn't even bother ringing the doorbell when he comes now - he just puts the seed straight in the shed for me. It's like he's the seed fairy.
Oh, by the way, I'm having a day off work today. My first since February 9. Who would begrudge me that?
posted by Andrew Collins @ 11:28 AM
11 Comments
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11 Comments:
Couldn't begrudge you a day off.
We've noticed bird activity in our garden these past couple of years. Last year a cat managed to get a robins nest :-(
This year we have an electronic cat deterrent Yay ! (it had better work !)
I was lucky enough to capture a robin taking a bath last year (video here if you're interested in that kind of thing)
http://spaces.msn.com/tugofwar/blog/cns!977E562923973D82!230.entry
The previous comment was clearly the work of an avian-pervert. What kind of man gets off on watching a robin bathing?
What kind of man gets off on watching a robin bathing?
- Batman?
Oh! A Robin
Well, I've just watched the robin film, Peter, and it is delightful.
[cough] anyone wanna buy this video I've got of a bird taking a bath [cough]
nudge nudge wink wink say no more
Sorry - I've just viewed it and it is very tastefully done.
Apologies, I thought it might be hardcore ornithological exploitation.
hey andrew, glad to see the blog back, i've missed your slant on life.
just before christmas, we gave a home to a 9 month old kitten, called Martha, having lost our previous cat, Benson after 17 years of faithful sleeping in front of the fire. Benson never brought any wildlife into the house, however, Martha has decided to show us what real cats do. yesterday, I spent two hours trying to, at first, get Martha to let go of the starling she had brought into the house, and then once i'd managed to get her locked in the bathroom, get the starling out of the house. I swear I had to move every piece of furniture downstairs. ever spent two hours talking to a starling? I have... still, it meant I didn't get any work done!
this follows a dead pidgeon, and two live mice. She's a lovely cat, but I'm not sure what to do about the wildlife collection she clearly wants to build in the house! is it just nature? do we just put up with it? bloggers, what say you?
We have two cats; sisters. One of them occasionally kills creatures and then leaves them. The other one kills creatures far more often but at least eats them. Neither is a particularly happy occasion, but the latter approach at least feels like Elton John's Circle of Life. Thankfully, our bird feeders are out of comfortable reach and the only birds that have been killed in two years have been those unfortunate enough to alight on the ground at the wrong time.
I don't know what's up with the birds round my way. I leave out food and they don't touch it for a day/day and a half. Then it all disappears in half an hour and I never see them do it. Could it be there are so many bird feeders around that they have to keep to a strict dining schedule visiting the gardens to timetable? Perhaps if I don't get the food out in time for their 10:30 slot I have to wait until next time - like missing the dustmen. Or is it that Pinner only has about a dozen overfed birds in total and they are too full to bother with my meager scraps; “Bread! He expects us to eat bread!? They’ve got live maggots at No. 38” (They like to feel it wriggle as it goes down). Perhaps it's just my presentation (they have to eat with their eyes...)
How do you keep the bloody squirrels at bay. They seem to get at least 75% of anything we put out for our feathered friends!
We don't keep ours at bay, Mark. It's impossible. I just use big feeders so that even when the squirrels are clinging to them, the birds can still feed. They learn to live together as long as the squirrels don't make any sudden movements.
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