Feeding birds in the Snow.

Passive Solar House in the Snow.
Originally uploaded by Mike Maunsell

Please don't forget to feed the birds in this snowy weather. I woke up this morning to a scene, I’d been hearing about in the UK. A last it reached Ireland, yes I know it causes chaos for commuters and schools are closed in a lot of towns, nut I spent a lot of my working life outdoors in mountains and I really miss snow. Anyway it’s important to feed birds to help them survive over this period. Spring is not too far off, just a few weeks to go. With natural food covered by snow it’s important to keep your bird feeders topped up. Put out food with high fat content, cheese, bacon rind, bird cake. Two days ago we couldn’t get to town because of flooding in Clonmel, so my 7yr old daughter and I spent some of the time making bird cake. Melted lard and add bird seed. Put it in a container, we use half a coconut with a string attached, let it cool and hang outside. Our latest modification is to get a 1 litre water bottle, about half way down cut a large hole, fill it with the warm bird cake and let it set, hang outside. This method we find prevents a lot of cake dropping onto the ground and so does not attract vermin.
Enjoy the snow, and the birds. Let me know about your own patch? What birds are you getting on the feeders? What are you feeding them?