The Birds and the Bees, A Cacophony of Delight

Despite the unusual weather we’ve been having here in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, the garden throughout the cold, and the heat and the muggy drizzling rainy days has been filled with delight.

This morning the bird seed feeder has been visited by a host of painted buntings (likely the same one’s who came last fall) there are 6 of them, a male and female cardinal (they’ve been around for a year). Last year they raised a brood here. And a series of blue jays have come and gone, calling out as they swoop down to the feeder. The hummingbird has been moving around the deck taking nectar from the salvia and the pink powder puff which are showing off this muggy warm January morning. The gray catbird and the mockingbird have snatched small round yellow berries from the bird pepper plant which occurs here naturally, and which I allow to grow where it seeds for the most part, for their benefit.

The smaller birds are moving through the branches of the majestic old oaks, and the large bright orioles have kept their distance moving through the wildness of the colorful bouganvillas.

The feeder is one I bought in fall to overcome the constant raiding of seed which was occuring with the old feeder. The squirrels can’t get into this one. So if you’re having a time of it keeping the squirrels out of the bird seed, try it out.

It’s a cylinder shape with wire grate which wraps the entire body of the cylinder. The wire is a distance of the average bird beak from the cylinder and seems to be impossible for the squirrels to get to. They will occasionally hang upside down from the feeder trying to figure it out. They are smart little creatures, but ultimately they give up and have to go forage for other delights in the garden.

The feeder is one of two red ones, tucked up under the yucca plant a the back of the old bench, just behind the sweet rescue dog making himself at home on the lounge chair, in the picture. It is the feeder on the right which the squirrels can’t raid.

Though the feeders are placed quite low and close to the deck for viewing pleasure, the birds still frequent them, as they are in a densely planted Greenscape with good protection from predators.

This entry was posted on 25. January 2010 at 07:39 and is filed under Green Gardening. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.