Sitting in the huge sunroom attached to the visitor center at the University of Mount Union’s Huston-Brumbaugh Nature Center, it’s like being behind the scenes at the filming of a nature special.
Red-bellied, downy and hairy woodpeckers chow down on peanuts, sunflower seeds and suet. Dark-eyed juncos, white-throated sparrows, pine siskins and red-breasted nuthatches self-serve at the buffet of seeds.
About 15 bird species frequent the nature center bird feeders at this time of year, both year-round residents and migrants passing through. With the numerous feeders put up in preparation for fall and winter, “it’s possible to see all 15 species in a span of 15 or 20 minutes,” said Adam Zorn.
Feeding system
He’s the nature center’s program manager, but his passion is birding. He’s responsible for engineering the feeding system, both literally and figuratively. Although some of the feeders are purchased, the nature center staff have built many others — and the structures that hold them. But it’s nothing that any other backyard birder can’t do. In other words, it’s not necessary to spend money on fancy feeders and equipment.
What Zorn does can serve as an example to those who want to sip coffee and watch birds out their windows this winter. In the summer, there are only four feeders up at the nature center, all filled with black oil sunflower seeds. The birds don’t really need feeders in the summer because there’s plenty of insects, seeds, fruit and other food available, Zorn said.
In early October, he began putting up more feeders with a greater variety of food including suet, peanuts, mixed seed and thistle seed. And the hummingbird and oriole feeders came down.
The thistle seed feeds the finches, although they’ve also been spotted eating black oil sunflower seeds. Goldfinches may be hard to recognize this time of year because they’ve traded their yellow feathers in favor of greenish-brown ones for better camouflage during the winter. Since it’s high in protein, the suet substitutes for insects once the weather gets colder.
Homemade suet
Zorn and the nature center staff make their own suet, called Zick Dough Improved from a recipe by Julie Zickefoose, an artist and writer from “the Appalachian foothills of Ohio,” according to her blog.
The staff do unique things with suet, like putting it in plastic bottle caps nailed to a board, or in gaps and holes in the bark of trees. They also put it in regular suet feeders, but in a plastic package, and upside down. Suet feeders are usually hung vertically, but Zorn installed chains on all four corners so that it hangs horizontally.
He refills a plastic package from store-bought suet with the homemade mixture. Then, he puts it in the feeder with the plastic facing up and the open side facing down, so birds have to eat from the underside of the feeder.
Protecting the food
Why make them do all these acrobatics? So the crows don’t eat all the suet, Zorn explained. They can’t peck through the plastic, so they can’t get to the pasty delicacy that they might otherwise consume in one sitting.
Strategy to keep bird food away from unwanted diners is also employed with the platform feeders that are used for mixed seed. “Mixed” means half black oil sunflower seed, the other half smaller seed, like millet, and cracked corn.
Sparrows, juncos and mourning doves eat the seed that falls to the ground. The mourning doves usually store the seed in their crops, then perch in a tree branch to digest it. The platform feeders are filled with just enough seed so that it’s gone by the end of the day and nothing is left for nocturnal-feeding raccoons.
If there were leftovers, raccoons would soon be there every night, and would no doubt raid the other feeders, too, Zorn said. That’s apparent from the claw scratches and muddy footprints at the bases of the black “baffles” that surround the posts holding bird feeders. The baffles are made out of stovepipe.
There are also clear plastic hoods or baffles on top of the feeders. It protects them from squirrels and chipmunks that might crawl down the chain if the feeder is suspended from a tree limb. They also protect the seed from rain and snow.
The nature center staff also made the peanut feeder out of hardware cloth, with plastic drain covers on the top and bottom. The black mesh gives the birds a place to hold on as they peck the peanut shells to get at the nuts inside, which seem especially appealing to woodpeckers and blue jays.
Winter water
Though it’s tough to keep bird baths from freezing, the birds still need them in the winter — not so much for baths, but for drinks. Zorn said bird bath heaters are available to keep the water from freezing. Or the bird bath can simply be emptied and refilled once a day.
And as the snow blows and the wind gets wicked, birds need some shelter. That could be as easy as a knee-high brush pile or a makeshift manger — a piece of plywood with one end on the ground and the other up — placed near the feeders. That’s also a good way to recycle a Christmas tree, either lying down or standing up, tied to a stake, so birds can perch in it during a storm.
Though the weather is getting colder, “migration continues,” Zorn said.”The birds are still moving through or into our area. There are still songbirds in our backyards, both visitors and year-round residents.”
Some birds come to Northeast Ohio every winter, like the dark-eyed juncos and white-throated sparrows. Others, like the pine siskins and red-breasted nuthatches, are occasional winter visitors.
This winter may bring more visitors than usual. A lot depends on food availability in Canada, “which tends to be boom or bust.” Zorn said. “Some years there are a ton of tree seeds, but every few years it fluctuates and the trees up there are light on seed production. This seems to be one of those years.”
Though some are migratory, most woodpeckers are year-round residents. Perhaps there’s been a gap of a few months since you’ve seen woodpeckers at your feeders, but that’s because they’ve gone off to feed in the woods or surrounding areas during the summer. The woodpeckers you see at the feeders now are the same ones that were there earlier, he said.
Nature center
Like just about everything else in Ohio, the nature center south of Alliance closed in March. But no one seemed to care; as the weather got warmer, people began using the center’s 4.5 miles of trails. The trails go by the center’s two ponds, as well as some vernal pools — temporary ponds that collect water in spring and summer and usually dry out by early fall. They’re a great place for spring peepers, tree frogs and toads to lay their eggs because there are no fish to eat them, Zorn said.
The visitor center is now open Tuesday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sundays from 2 to 4 p.m.
Some time in November, the huge room with all the windows will also be open, probably for two hours in the morning and two hours in the afternoon, he said. It will be a great place for folks to sit and watch birds outside the room’s many windows. Or, you can follow Zorn’s lead for winter feeding and watch them from your own.
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