I put one up like 2 years ago and have really enjoyed it. We get a bit of everything, crows, cardinals, blue jays, morning doves, eastern blue birds and a whole host of smaller birds. It's interesting to see who likes to eat from the ground and those who like the feeder. Its usually the medium sized birds that make a mess of the feeder and then your larger and smallest birds are clean up crew, along with 3 VERY fat squirrels. I suppose one of them finally got to the feeder and broke it so now I'm in the market for a new one this year. I miss seeing my doves and cardinals.

The kids, my wife and my cat have come to love having it. My wife now wants to add a bird bath nearby.

My wife and I have been feeding finches and doves along with cardinals as the main visitors along with the dreaded squirrels for more years than I can remember. We used to put out shelled peanuts on the ground but our backyard neighbor complained rightfully so even though it’s their pine trees planted right on the property line the squirrels hang out in. We do have a hawk that visits occasionally but he seems to prefer the doves and not the squirrels unfortunately and he/she is definitely hanging out when the baby rabbits come due. I will agree the feeders become a mess but the rabbit who lives under my shed does a pretty fair job cleaning up at night and my mower keeps most of the mess clean during lawn maintenance season. My absolute favorites hands down are the hummingbirds who visit during the season as my wife absolutely loves planting flower pots and hibiscus are one of our favorite plants along with the hummingbirds.

4 hours ago, Eric 26 said:

My absolute favorites hands down are the hummingbirds who visit during the season as my wife absolutely loves planting flower pots and hibiscus are one of our favorite plants along with the hummingbirds.

They remind me of fairies in fairy tales.

2 minutes ago, Swamp Girl said:

They remind me of fairies in fairy tales.

I couldn’t agree more. They are really fun to watch and seemingly have zero fear when we’re outside.

When I throw scratch grains to my chickens all kinds of little birds spawn in. Yellow ones are the most common. The brown ones are the funniest, and the grey ones don’t get along with the blue ones. Matter of fact the blue ones don’t get along with anything.

We hang 'several" feeders out during the year.

Some we bring in during winter to discourage squirrel raids.

However, we leave out the thistle and suet.

Pileated woodpeckers are big fans of the suet, and my wife "modified" a couple of commercial feeders to better accommodate them.

A side benefit is these big birds have just about eliminated every

hanging wasp nest on our property.

Here's some up-close and personal video from last winter.

A-Jay

We have a pileated, a flicker, group of 7 eastern blues, bunch of doves, a barred owl, a family of red tails and the typical blue jays, Cardinals, nuthatches, purple finches etc.

Flicker

On my mower

Barred owl

I have to kill a bunch of chipmunks every year, that my neighbor ladies draw in with their bird feeders. Pesky little critters. My mom feeds birds and has a mouse problem because of the seeds.

Now @T-Billy , I used to have to tell my customers all the time that a chipmunk cannot harm their property. Why on earth would you have to kill them? They always told me it said on the Internet that they could undermine the foundation of their home 😂. This is why I hate AI and Google. Why did they bother digging footers if they could have just handed a chipmunk a tiny spoon

22 hours ago, deaknh03 said:

Barred owl

What he do to get barred? 🤣

Really cool pic of the flicker! Never saw one before.

Hummingbirds enjoying a drink after a stormy night

4 hours ago, TnRiver46 said:

Now @T-Billy , I used to have to tell my customers all the time that a chipmunk cannot harm their property. Why on earth would you have to kill them? They always told me it said on the Internet that they could undermine the foundation of their home 😂. This is why I hate AI and Google. Why did they bother digging footers if they could have just handed a chipmunk a tiny spoon

The lady I bought the house from must have stored bird seed or something they liked in the breezeway because they chewed through the wall to get in. They crawl up under the corners of my vinyl siding to presumably store seeds/nuts in my walls. They dig holes all over my yard. I'll continue to drown as many of those destructive little buggers as I can catch. Those bucket traps work great. You can catch multiple critters without resetting it.

On 2/17/2026 at 1:26 AM, NorcalBassin said:

Sometimes I like to open the Merlin Bird ID app to check which birds are chirping around the yard while I'm enjoying a morning coffee on the porch.

Thanks. Hadn't heard of Merlin. I will check it out. I have used BirdNet for many years. It seemed somewhat revolutionary when I first used it. No doubt it has been surpassed by now.

I converted a 120 gallon cooler to bird food storage to keep the mice at bay in the garage. We buy black oil sunflower seed and hot suet cakes in bulk

@T-Billy , I saw one that apparently got confused and stored several beckets worth of gravel in a crawl space 😂

Maybe we're just fortunate regarding mice.

Bird feeder is located 15 yards from the house and 20 yards from our RV and not a mouse stirring.

I see quite a few Shrews on the property though.

5 hours ago, T-Billy said:

I'll continue to drown as many of those destructive little buggers as I can catch.

My father came to my house in Maine many years ago and we sat down and had a beer. He saw the chipmunks running all over the place and a couple went under my patio. He gets up and goes to his car and comes back with 2 smoke bombs. I'm like; "What are you doing?" He was going to drop a couple of smoke bombs down 2 holes Bill Murry style in Caddy Shack. "Dad, my kids are 2 and 5 y/o right inside the house, I'll keep the chipmunks." HAHA

We've been checking off the different birds as we ID them for years now.

The "Bird Book" (complete with detailed pictures) has the dates of each sighting.

While most all of the usual suspects have shown up,

we haven't had a 'new' entry in a while.

But late this past fall Lynn snapped a picture of the one and only 'evening grosbeak' we've spotted so far.

Pretty cool colorings, especially in the snow.

A-Jay

My ornithology professor had a full blown come-apart when I was in college on a birdwatching walk. We came across a rose breasted grosbeak and I’ve never seen anyone so excited 😂. We had no clue it was significant

2 hours ago, TnRiver46 said:

My ornithology professor had a full blown come-apart when I was in college on a birdwatching walk. We came across a rose breasted grosbeak and I’ve never seen anyone so excited 😂. We had no clue it was significant

We had one of those in our yard a couple of years ago, I assume he was migrating through because he only hung around a couple of days. This picture I took when he was on our patio right by the back door.

I put a feeder out for the first time a couple weeks ago. Already have multiple species of birds flocking to it every morning and we really enjoy watching them.

So, I learned something this morning. I often put this and that up by the road for the crows. They appreciate my offerings and give me gifts, which they leave on my portico steps, such as rocks and shells. Well, last night, I killed three mice in my basement and I also had an old Johnsonville brat, which I cut up for them. I figured they'd eat the brat bits first. Nope. They took the mice first. I also left some corn and kale crackers for them. Those chips are still there.

Saturday afternoon our hawk visited and wound up picking off another dove.

Wow, Eric! I saw a Purple finch today. Not a big deal for a lot of you, but it's the first one I've seen in several years.

We have a feeding station next to my wife's massive garden.

Species we've seen:

chickadees

nuthatches

blue jays

woodpeckers -hairy, downy, red bellied

ruby throated hummingbirds

starlings

grackles

Coopers hawk

Some species we've seen within eyesight of the station:

barred owl, bald eagle, kestrels, great blue heron,

Some acquaintances that were very special.... ****(injured redtail hawk I brought to a raptor rehabber/falconer)

The goose, Phoenix, adopted us. He just showed up one day by the gate. My wife let him in and he stayed. That was about 10 years ago. Currently he's outdoor security and my outdoor project supervisor.