The bird feeder…
So I was wondering why all of a sudden I had to refill my new bird feeder on a daily basis. Initially, a refill would last some 4-5 days. Then the squirrels found out about it and the refill frequency dwindled to 2-3 days.
Lately the feeder has been empty each morning. Last night, I happened to flip on the back deck light and peer outside before retiring to bed and noticed a couple of visitors under the bird feeder... rather large visitors, I might add. There were 2 absolutely beautiful does helping themselves to whatever they could, both in and out of the feeder.
At last the mystery is solved, and as far as I can tell, there at least has not been a visit from a bear yet. How do I know? I'm only guessing this because the feeder is still intact and hanging off of the deck.
A few years ago, I lost a bird feeder to a bear. I found the feeder quite damaged, removed from its hanger, dragged some 50 feet over a rock wall in my back yard, and urinated on. There were plenty of bear tracks from the original location to the final resting place of that old feeder. In fact, this story was recently refreshed in my head when I took a load of scrap metal objects to the dump about 4 days ago. One of those objects was that old feeder...
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Well, in hindsight, I guess that the deer were one of the reasons for the empty feeder… then came the squirrels! Those little buggers could empty the feeder in 2 or 3 hours…
As much as I love nature, funding a bird feeder ransacking event every day started to get expensive (not to mention frustrating). So armed with a $10 bill, I drive to Home Depot and got myself one of them there high-falutin’ fancy transparent plastic squirrel baffles.
I was amazed with the baffle for two reasons:
1. The squirrels really can’t get past it, and
2. My cat Rocko decided it made a great hiding spot.
#1 I was thrilled about; #2 not so much… During the few months that have elapsed since I installed the baffle, there have only been 2 avian fatalities… none of course would be best, but although I do see Rocko’s predatorial interest in birds as somewhat of a “survival of the fittest” natural feline instinct, I had to tell Rocko that it is technically cheating and way uncool…
Rocko tells me that he knows this, but he has unquestionably already proven that he needs not any help in demonstrating his superiority in the food chain… my only response to him was “don’t tell me that the squirrels are higher than you on the food chain?!” Rocko has yet to catch a squirrel.
The saga continues…