Bird Feeder - tuesday treasures

Dylan loves looking out of windows and at the sky he sees planes way before we do.

He used to go to home based day care one day a week when he was 18mths and Lisa made a bird feeder for him to watch because he loved looking out her front ranch slider talking about the birds. He even did a painting of a blackbird after this activity.

I was inspired to make one at home for us to watch too :D

Its quite simple all you need is;

pine cone,

some string,

scissors,

butter knife, lard/peanut butter (something sticky basically)

plastic container big enough to roll pine cone in

and bird seed.

Make your bird feeder

1. Use scissors to cut a long piece of string to hang the bird feeder.
2. Take the string and tie a knot around the pine cone near the top (at the stalk end).
3. Tie a knot in the other end of the string so you can hang your bird feeder.
4. Use the butter knife to spread the peanut butter and or lard mixture inside the pine cone and around the edges.
5. Roll covered pine cone in seed in container, ( I actually used a take away container with sides easier for the toddler to use and keep seeds slightly more contained!) and when done sprinkle birdseed over any gaps in it.

Pick a place in your backyard that's safe from predators - at least 3 m off the ground and at the end of a tree branch.

Hang your bird feeder and wait for the birds~ it took a day for them to find it..

Take your bird feeder down at night so rats or mice don't get to it. (I have to confess I didn't do this as I have cats that control this population)

During springtime you won't get many birds using the feeder as natural food sources will be readily available again.

It was a really succesful activity in our house the birds ate it all we did it a throughout winter and I used 'Wild bird seed' to encourage the native birds from the supermarket.
love noni