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Red-shouldered Hawk
photo by Mary Collier
Click photo to enlarge |
If you are one who has been feeding the birds this winter, you have undoubtedly had LOTS of birds at your feeders. Their movement is reminiscent of fish in an aquarium, but you don’t have to change the water in this tank. One way to attract even more species to your viewing area is to put up a suet feeder filled with real beef suet…..the birds love it. This winter I filled a large feeder with beef suet before going to Florida for 6 weeks. (Suet, trimmings of beef fat, may be available from your grocery butcher.) The suet was the only food provided during the 6 weeks. When we got home there were some remnants of suet left and the birds were still coming. The feeder had helped them survive in our absence.
I put out fresh suet and began to count the species that came to feast on this rich food source. Some of the birds you would expect to eat suet came daily. All the woodpeckers came to dine: Flicker, Sapsucker (immature), Hairy (both male and female), Downy (both sexes), and Red-Bellied (both sexes) but there has been no Pileated yet. Chickadees, Titmice, Nuthatches, Starlings, and Blue Jays were all regularly at the suet. A more surprising bird was a Carolina Wren which came frequently and fed even while other birds were present. But the most astonishing sight was two Red-Shouldered Hawks that grabbed onto the feeder and fed for many minutes on several occasions. Having a hawk at the feeder is like having a shark in your aquarium!
The feeder was designed and constructed by Renee Davis from 1 inch hardware cloth attached to pieces of tree limbs. It is approximately 16”long X 12”wide X 1 ½ “deep. I attached it to the trunk of a cedar tree with heavy wire to keep animals from pulling it down, and the birds could feed on the suet from both sides of the feeder. Often there are 2 or 3 species on the feeder at one time. It is a great source of entertainment.
 — Mary Collier
Warblings, Spring 2015
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 "Red-shouldered Hawk at suet basket, photo by Mary Collier")
