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Of birds and seed.



Earlier this week, our country got some disappointing, yet inevitable news. Community transmission of COVID-19 was back and as a result, we may all be returning to lockdown.

While the government was working out what to do, everyone began to respond a little differently. Some played the blame game or jumped on ever so helpful conspiracy theories. Others started stockpiling toilet paper and flour again, as they seemingly must have used up their hoard from the previous lockdown. Some selfishly hurried off to their baches, trying to escape to a place where they could spend the time fishing.

In my usual, unusual way, I decided that we immediately needed to get some wild bird seed.

It’s not really the first thing you’d think to get when you’re preparing for a potential lockdown. Most would probably go for paint or vegetable seedlings or chocolate. But alas, this was my first thought to entertain my bird-enthusiast toddler.

This posed the next question though, what to do with 1kg of bird seed? Like obviously we could just take it to the park and chuck it on the ground, but firstly I’m not sure if that's an ecologically responsible thing to do (maybe a small part of my degree lives on after all) and secondly, I wanted to do something fun. So we decided to make our own bird feeders using the seed, which means that we get the added bonus of getting to watch the birds (hopefully) enjoy their feast!

I’m going to get straight to the point. I’m not crafty. Or arty. Pinterest makes me feel nervous and inadequate. I’m more in the “let’s get messy and see what happens” category of toddler play rather than the “let’s make something amazing” group.

So here’s what we came up with. The result of a very happy toddler, some Googling, some trouble-shooting, and some mistakes.

Tangelo bird feeders!

1) Gather your supplies. You'll need some type of fruit or vegetable to act as the container for the seed. we used tangelos, simply because that's what we had on hand. But oranges, passionfruit, or capsicum would probably work just as well. I have no idea if any of these are safe for birds to eat though, so venture ahead at your own risk.

You'll also need a knife, spoon, an oven tray, and some bird seed. If you plan to hang your bird feeders, you'll also need some string and a needle.

2) Cut your chosen fruit or vegetable in half and scoop out the flesh. Wow that sentence was gross to write. Anyway, my toddler adored doing this. She also loved that she got to eat what we scooped out. Try to remove as much as you can without damaging the skin.



3) Grill the scooped-out halves on the lowest oven setting until they have dried a bit (if you want). After doing this step, I realized that you probably don't need to actually do this. So do it if you want. I'm not sure why I did this in the first place, but it did make our house smell nice which was a bonus. I grilled them (wow that sounds American) until most of the moisture was gone, but they weren't so dry that they were on fire. You know, a happy medium.


4) Thread string through the skin if you want to hang up the feeders. This is another step I started and then realized I didn't need to do it. The string/ribbon/twine ended up being fiddly and tricky to hang on our chosen tree, so I ended up just wedging each feeder between a pair of sturdy branches. Anyway, if you want to get all professional about it, use a needle to make holes in the skin and thread pieces of string through to make handles. Good luck.

5) Fill each feeder with bird seed. This step was a close second favorite for my toddler. She loved scooping and transferring the seed with different sized spoons and then sweeping up the spills afterward.



6) Place your finished feeders in a tree of your choosing. You can either hang the feeders like Christmas ornaments from the tree and then admire your handiwork forevermore, or you can do a me and just wedge them between branches and hope that they stay there. Either way, the birds should hopefully enjoy their new snack!

So here's our contribution to the global lockdown survival guide. Once we finished making the feeders, it was announced that our region wasn't going into lockdown after all, so the blood, sweat, and swear words at the tangled ribbon were more futile than expected. But alas! We had fun. And we hope to eventually be able to spot some birds enjoying our craft through the window. Fingers crossed!





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