eBirdseed.com Wild Bird Feeding Blog

Posted by CapeCodAlan at 3:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Case of the Missing Mealworms

Hi all,

They ain't very pretty are they? Unfortunately, mealworms aren't very plentiful right now either. But why? I checked a bunch of Web sites and forums, and the explanations ranged from "I don't know!" to an issue with aflatoxins, (very nasty, wee, moldy-based beasties that attack the animal's liver). Then I called a few of the "mega-mealie" growers, and most responded with yet more "I don't know!"s. But two suppliers (who shall go nameless) were very blunt - the demand has skyrocketed... Period.

So what's really going on here? I'm not sure, but I'll offer a guess... The cost of oil and gas has folks both scared and ticked off to the point where they're retreating back into the "Comfort Zone" of their backyards... Four dollars per gallon of gasoline really shook not just individuals, but our culture to the core... We're afraid of the rising cost of energy, we're working harder to earn the paycheck, and we're mad at both our politicians and ourselves for letting this energy situation fester for 30 years... And finally, we're starting to look for value... For many, a $2,000, 5-day jaunt to Vegas doesn't quite contain the value of a $2,000, life-time investment in the backyard, including taking care of the birds... And if that means buying lots of mealworms, so be it...

There's a word that's all the rage now... "Staycations"... There's a reason for that term...

Bottom line? We'll bust our backsides to find you mealworms and their brethren, but this isn't going to be easy.

See you by the feeders,

CapeCodAlan

Posted by CapeCodAlan at 12:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Building a Trellis (Part 2), Orioles Cussing, and Our Newsletter

Hi all,

Time to continue the work begun earlier in, Building a Garden Trellis (Part 1)... The basic idea was to create something like the CAD image below.

In short, we were thinking of a modest structure that...

was roughly 6' by 32" by 24" deep
takes its footing from pressure-treated 2 x 4s sunk into the ground apx. 18"
wasn't going to break the bank
would only take a few weekends to construct
was modular in form such that parts could be easily replaced as time and tide dictated
feared no wind or weather
didn't make the eyes bleed from sheer ugliness

That behind us, let's stop stacking BBs and begin! The shot below is of the garden just before we cried "Havoc!"

380_Moments%20before%20start%20of%20trellis%20construction.JPG

Not bad, but let's see what we can build! After creating the arches, the first step was to make some measurements and dig some well-aligned holes... Once those were dug, I temporarily tossed in a few extra-long 2 x 4s, leaning the trellises and the arches just to give the team a clue. (Note oriole flying away.)

383_trellis%20leaning%20on%20sunken%202%20x%204s%20and%20temp%20arches_but%20with%20oriole%20flying%20away.JPG

Alright, so truth be told... Between the orioles and the catbirds, building this thing ain't been easy...

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Below, we've cut away the excess 2 x 4s, and stainless-steel bolted the trellis to the weatherproof stubs making sure that it's clear of the ground. And as always, the secret to construction lies in getting all things level, plumb and square...

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Threats of rain stopped our final assembly... But all that's needed now is to align and anchor the arches, secure the arch cross members, seal, and plant creepers... (Mrs. CCA and I will keep you updated on the final progress...)

A couple of side notes...

Did you know that orioles could cuss? As we worked on the trellis, (close to the oriole feeder) the wife and I got chewed out! I mean, in your face, eye-contact, "fly-by your head cussing" nasty... Hmmm... Me thinks they know not who givith the Holy Grape Jelly...

Finally (and on a completely different note), if you're interested in receiving our newsletter (complete with sale items and tips), just use the "Comment" button below and let me know. Or, you can email me directly at: capecodalan@ebirdseed.com. And there's no need to worry about us handing off your contact info to others... We don't work that way.

See you by the feeders,

CapeCodAlan

Posted by CapeCodAlan at 4:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We All Scream for Ice Cream!

Welcome Summer! Today at 3:59 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time Summer officially started. So begin the days of cook-outs, picnics, beaches, bicycles, swimming pools, canoes and kayaks, nature walks, and wonderful weather. Bird feeders are crowded and many young birds are in the final stages of fledging; you can still see them fluffing themselves up on tree branches, begging for Mom or Dad to pop in one last mouthful before they have to buckle down to the task of feeding themselves. But Summer is a time of plenty, and these youngsters should have no problems finding sustenance on their own. And be sure to keep your feeders filled to make it a bit easier on them.

Be sure, also to stock up on your favorite summer treats: fresh fruit, sun brewed iced tea, wonderful garden vegetables, and that perennial favorite: ice cream. Here at Casa CapeCod, we like our ice cream nice and fresh. And that means--just like we do with clam chowder--we make it here at home! (Well, we do now...) Having just purchased a small ice cream maker we set out to plumb its mysteries. The thing comes with simple operating instructions and some simple recipes. I made a quick trip to the market for milk and cream, and then we were off. I was disappointed right off the bat, because with all the effort we put in last night, we didn't actually end up with ice cream! Evidently you start by making a "base" which has to chill for several hours, so we stored the base in the fridge, put the freeze cylinder in the freezer, and washed up for the night.

But tonight... oh tonight there is homemade mint chocolate chip ice cream and much rejoicing in this house.

I have to admit, it's easier than I thought it would be, once I got past the fact that it's a two-day process. The Cuisinart Ice-Cream Maker is small, sleek, easy to store, but makes some mean ice cream. You simply pour the base into the frozen cylinder, pop in the paddle, switch on the machine, and in 25 minutes, presto--ice cream! Oops, not so fast! Once the ice cream has been churned, it still has to "ripen." So we scraped it out of the cylinder and put in a plastic tub and popped the tub in the freezer for a few hours. And, er... it has now officially been a few hours, so we are going to go scoop up some delicious homemade ice cream and relax with a bowl, a spoon, and perhaps a cheesy movie.

Hmmm. I wonder if we could make sunflower seed ice cream?

See you by those summer feeders,

Mrs. CapeCodAlan

P.S. CCA adds, Homebrewed beer ain't bad for Summer fare either!

Posted by CapeCodAlan at 12:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Midwest Floods

Hi all,

By now you've no doubt heard of the flooding in the Midwest, but reminders can't hurt...

Tough stuff... Tough, dangerous, sometimes lethal stuff...

OK... Where to begin? Well, if you've got the means, you can always donate to the Red Cross. That's a great start! Struggling for words here... Not much to say beyond that... There's a lot of work ahead.

It's so hard for most of us to understand what the folks in the Midwest are going through... Perhaps the following is a good way of looking at the situation... Wherever you are right now, take a look around. Obviously, you're looking at a computer screen, but what else? CDs? DVDs? Books? Pets? Maybe a stereo system or a sewing machine... Who knows? The point being that you imagine that you've just an hour to get out of your house. (A house by the way that you sweat blood to earn.) And that's it... Just 60 minutes to prep before the waters rise to unimaginable an uninsured levels. So what do you take? A few special books? Dad's rocker? Tax records? A wedding dress? Food? No seriously, look around... What would you take in the next 55 minutes?

And after you evacuate, what did you leave behind? Aunt Frances' Bible? A rough old family painting? Maybe silly love letters from long ago... Gone... All gone...

And that's the situation in this flooding... People can replace stuff, jobs, and even careers... But replacing "past" ain't so easy. Take a look at the photo below... The white cabinet is readily available on the Net... But the toolbox on top is a different story... I built that, and among the woods used to construct it is 200 year-old pine given to us by a dear friend. If something happens to that toolbox, the past is lost forever. Gone... All gone...

New%20white%20hutch%20with%20toolbox_400.JPG

I prattle on... Sorry...

Again, if you can help out heartland America, contact the Red Cross

See you by the feeders,

CapeCodAlan

Posted by CapeCodAlan at 12:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Blah Sunday Night

Hi all,

Wasn't the best of weekends - rainy/overcast last night and much of today... Blah and cool outside now... Emily Dickinson was quite right - Nature is sometimes caught without her diadem... Tis a good time to wander through the old local hard drive...

Let's see...

Yeah, that's a nice grackle shot... Good rich blacks and purples... Fantastic white iris... Twisting action... Great claws and scutella... Fun and interesting.

Let's take a look in our free, public, Web-based library... This group of starlings offers color that will brighten up a dull night.

Sad that both the Starlings and the Grackles are considered to be "nuisance birds"... True, they can "hog" feeders, but they are beautiful. We've had very good luck providing several feeders. Each bird type seems to gravitate to its own station - the ubiquitous "LBBs" (Little Brown Birds like the sparrows) and grackles tend to use the main and the squirrel feeders, the finches rest on the tubular finch supply, and hoards of crows and starling like the "Crow Trough". Natch that the ground birds like the mourning doves would clean up spillage. Thankfully, we've never had to deal with so-called "nuisance birds".

Ummm... What else can we dig out of the Web library? How about a great side shot of a ruby-throated hummingbird! Obviously, they tend to their own sugar water feeders, but I haven't seen many lately. (You can use the link below to watch their feeders live during the daytime.) For those of you who haven't been putting out clear nectar (one part sugar dissolved into solution under low heat to 4 parts water), you're missing the show! Hummers are brave, delicate, inquisitive little creatures... Ahhh... You guys already knew that!

Getting late and I'm getting goofy...

See you by the feeders,

CapeCodAlan

Posted by CapeCodAlan at 11:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A Cardinal and a Nuke Sub

Hi all,

Female%20or%20juvenile%20cardinal_403_DSC_0134.JPG

Well, the NovaBird camera is "sort of" back online. The snapshot above of a female (or perhaps juvenile) cardinal was taken with the ailing rig. (Click here and then use the magnifying glass pointer to see the photo in all its glory.) Basically, the camera has a grudge against its battery. More accurately, it's starting to draw quite a bit of current (a bummer for a battery), and now only the transformer can keep the cam happy. Time will tell... Anyway, today we got roughly 150 photos over a 3-hour interval, which is pretty good.

Also, it looks like our young house sparrows are fledging, and if they weren't so "lentille peu coopÃ©ratif" ("camera shy" in breathtakingly horrid french) I'd have pictures for you. Unfortunately, the sparrows are "lentille peu coopÃ©ratif", and there you go.

Other stuff... (Read that, "Brace yourself, the idiot writing this is bored!")

Normally, we go out of our way to keep company business out of this blog. And that's as it should be... We write about backyard birding, and feeders, and occasionally about more esoteric stuff like fixing a grill or the universe or God. But not tonight... Tonight I'm going to "out" a nasty little company secret within eBirdseed.com. (I prefer to think of this as "McClellan'ing" my boss...) Onward... Roughly a month ago, Gordon (one of the owners of the company) asked if I wanted some sort of backyard critter gadget as a sort of grist for the blogging mill. (Example: We sell a squirrel "Ferris wheel thingy" that would make for some great photos.) So far, so good. Being both an engineer and an amateur birder, I suggested that the company purchase a more practical (though slightly pricier) backyard birding adjunct - a nuclear submarine.... Ok, ok, ok... There were upsides and downsides... Let's take a look...

Birds love boats. Show me a picture of a marina without birds, and I'll show you a picture of the moon. (Editor's note: "Huh?")
My suggested below-surface vehicle would "over budget" the company by roughly $2.6 billion... Alright, there's a point there... That would take some creative financing.
But think of the Super Bowl ads... Envision an eBirdseed.com nuclear sub in some guys' backyards covered in feeders and bedecked with a huge beer banner on the side. Cha-Ching! (Eat your heart out Bud Light blimp.)
Squirrel problems? Cat problems? Coyote problems? Nothing that an Exocet missile can't fix.
The wife and I would get to play with the nuclear power plant and control rods. While we have no actual training dancing with a nuclear reactor, we're both pretty good foosball players, and I'm betting that we could handle those graphite control rods just fine.
And suppose the worst did happen... Suppose we did go critical and cut Cape Cod in half and turned Nantucket Sound into a rolling boil. Everyone likes a clambake, right? Besides, "eBirdseed.com" would be on everyone's lips... Still more Cha-Ching!

Ya see? Ya see? Lack of imagination on the part of management is going to deprive our backyard birds of a desperately needed nuclear submarine.

Still, Hades hath no fury like an engineer scorned... Watch this blog and you will see birds and a working fusion-powered sub.

See you by the feeders and bring a periscope!

CapeCodAlan

Posted by CapeCodAlan at 4:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Conservation Land and a Camera...

Hi all,

Today, we got some rather nice news... Our neighbors, (who shall remain nameless for the sake of privacy) just donated a nearby plot of land to the Harwich Conservation Trust. It's a small lot, but significant just the same.

Both the wife and I (and obviously others) know how much those woods are used by every type of imaginable wildlife... To our neighbors, (and my family's friends for decades...) You've done a good thing... Thank you.

If you're interested in donating land, contact your local conservation trust, harbormaster (harbormaster's have all the contacts), police or fire chief, resource officer... Also, you can also email me at: capecodalan@ebirdseed.com or use the "Comment" button below... In any event, even a half acre makes a significant difference.

Onward!

Now about that pesky NovaBird remote, movement-triggered camera that just doesn't want to play nice... Sometimes it works, and but mostly it's deader than Julius Caesar. Looks like we have two problems...

Here are the troubleshooting steps taken so far, and an almost final conclusion... Problem number 1 was the battery. We replaced that with mixed luck... (The old one seemed to be pushing up daisies. Now, I'm not so sure, though it definitely has seen much better days.) I briefly tested the camera using the battery recharger as a power source and the camera worked fine for roughly 60 seconds, then died. With enough fussing, the new battery will spring to life in all of its 6.46 VDC glory, and the camera will follow, but only for 60 seconds... Time to remove the battery from the equation. We're going to try hooking the Nova' directly to 120 AC via its transformer... Not elegant, but better than a kick in the head....

And that brings us to problem number 2... Even using a steady power source, the camera exhibits the same troubled behavior as it did under the auspices of the battery -- Flakey. Still, we'll keep you posted, but the conclusion probably just ain't going to be pretty. Perhaps it's time to think of "Plan "B"".

See you by the feeders,

CapeCodAlan

Posted by CapeCodAlan at 2:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Camera Updates, Sparrows, Snapping Turtles, etc.

Hi all,

We've got kind of a smorgasbord for ya...

First, an update on the crippled NovaBird remote, movement-triggered camera... We finally received the new battery, and it's holding a charge like a champ. But, (you just knew there was a "but" in there somewhere didn't you?) the device will only remain "on" for a few minutes. The oriole photo below is from the partially-resurrected Nova' cam'.

The camera "wants" to work, but something still just ain't right. Time will tell... The simple fact may be that 5,000 to 10,000 pics is a max for the rig... Again, time will tell...

Onward...

Well, the sparrows seem quite happy in their house... The young ones should be fledging soon...

That should be interesting...

For what it's worth, the photo above was shot with the little Vivitar 8600s (8.1 MP). Obviously the picture is nothing to write home about. Neither is the snapshot below of a rabbit taken with the very respectable Canon EOS Rebel XT 8MP...

(And yes I know about handling "red-eye", etc. I'm just not very good at it yet.) These lousy bunny and sparrow photos illustrate all too well the danger of inadequate "f-stop experience" coupled with inappropriate lenses. Still, given a little luck, and a short focal distance, even the 8600s can more than hold her own.

My guess is that practice and the right lens goes a long way.

One final serving from the smorgasbord... Keep an eye out for snapping turtles. One of the local natural resources mavens has warned that 'tis the season for the turtles to lay eggs... At best, they're not the most social of creatures, and at this time of year... Well... They can get downright cranky. (Kidding aside, snapping turtles have remarkably long necks, and can strike with amazing speed from almost any angle. A full-grown Canadian Goose is no match for a big snapper. Give those terrapins a wide berth! For a first-hand account, check out "Snapping Turtle Saga - Part I" and "Gordon and his Boys Wrestle Snapping Turtle - Part II".)

Time to run... Be safe, and see you by the feeders,

CapeCodAlan