BS: Our Feathered Friends

Subject: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: Bobert
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 05:53 PM

Just a reminder to folks who under under the *Big Freeze*, our bird friends need water. So if you have feeders and there is not a water source around for them you might want to find a cheapie water heater for your bird bath.

Tweet, tweet..

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: Leadfingers
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 06:44 PM

And always remember NOT to put hot water in the birdbath@cos it freezes faster than cold water. That is a scientific fact - Honest

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 07:07 PM

Keep 'em warm by putting the birds in a cat

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: Bobert
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 07:35 PM

Bad Clint, bad...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: Sorcha
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 08:33 PM

Good idea, Bobert, but don't EVER call him Clint...........

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 08:35 PM

It's not bad at all... it's called The Food Chain...

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: mack/misophist
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 10:09 PM

Some comments:
    Birds bathe in dust as often as water. Giving them bath water
    in the winter could easily kill them if they used it for that.

    Birds have found drinking water in the winter for a million
    years. They likely still can.

    Food is another matter.

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: Bobert
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 10:21 PM

Sorry Clinton.

Ahh, birds, unlike humans, know when to use the water for drinking and when to use it for bathing, misophist. Yep, get it real cold and icey and you'll find a few folks who think that is the ideal time to go swimmin'. Hmmmmmm? Darwinism at it's best, I'd say!

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: greg stephens
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 02:24 AM

is halva ok as bird food? We've got a tub of old halva and are wondering what to do with it.

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: open mike
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 03:59 AM

my dad rigged up a light bulb which was under neath
a bird watering pan. the pan was metal so conducted
the heat from the bulb. this arrangement kept the
water from freezing in nebraska where it gets way
below zero at times...that is one reason i am not
there any more!
i just got a wire cage suet holder/feeder.
some critters need fat to help them keep
warm. pet bird seed mixes for winter warmth contain
oats and groats. i guess that is buckwheat groats.
these help the body make heat i guess.
perhaps that is why oat meal is good for winter
breakfast for us two leggeds.

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: Rapparee
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 08:14 AM

Well, I was going to say that Bobert was wrong and that hot water doesn't and can't freeze faster than cold, so I did a search on the topic. To my surprise, the answer seems to be "not proven."

There is a long, detailed explanation here about the Mpemba Effect, as it's called. What it boilsl down to is that scientists don't know for sure and are having a really tough time proving one way or the other.

Interesting. Now I'm thinking about how to prove or disprove it.

I'll do this while I toss food out for the birds. (Can't do a birdbath in a third floor condo.)

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: mouldy
Date: 25 Jan 03 - 04:28 AM

I have left a lot of apples on the ground and the blackbirds love them. My garden visitors have also been fed cold cooked rice, mashed potato, left over Christmas cake and pud as well as proprietory bird feed, bird peanuts (not the sort designated for humans) and a fat/insect block. Apart from the apples, all on a med/small bird table. The nut feeders and fat block hang from hooks on the corners.

Note for any UK birders - don't forget: this weekend is the RSPB's Big Garden Birdwatch.

Andrea

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: open mike
Date: 25 Jan 03 - 05:07 AM

what is this?
fat/insect block
I am not sure i have ever heard of this..
ane there bugs imbedded in suet,
like an insect in amber??

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: mouldy
Date: 26 Jan 03 - 03:03 AM

Correct! They appear to be very small bugs, or minced up bits of bug, so the whole thing just looks speckled. The starlings are going mad for it. I bought it from a stall dealing in bird feeds at a fair just before Christmas. It came in a plastic tub and has a string through the middle. Once you get it out of the tub there's a plastic mesh bag you can encase it in as reinforcement for when you hang it. This also prevents guzzlers like the starlings from tearing chunks off.

Andrea

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: The Shambles
Date: 26 Jan 03 - 05:50 AM

Has anyone any idea where that phrase 'our feathered friends' comes from?

Sadly the media tend to use it everytime thay have an item that has anything even remotely to do with birds. Even when the the item may be a serions concern or well intended, as this thread was.

I had a little time to spare on Friday, and visited the RSPB reserve at West Sedgemoor, near Taunton in Somerset. There were feeders provided in the woods close to the hide, which was a 30 second walk from the car park.

In the 10 minutes that I spent there and up very close, I had the best views I have ever had of GS Woodpecker, nuthatch, treecreeper, long-tailed-,coal, blue and great tits. It was really enjoyable and I think it well shows the value of feeders, and that they will enhance even a natural setting. Although it is important that the feeders are a permanent fixture, once started.

Also that you don't have to have hours and hours of spare time to appreciate these places, although this would be nice....

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: The Shambles
Date: 26 Jan 03 - 05:57 AM

The Times
January 13, 2003

Pensioner evicted for feeding the birds
By Simon de Bruxelles

A PENSIONER is to be evicted from her housing association flat because she refused to stop feeding the birds in the back garden.
For three years Barbara Simpson, 64, has attracted flocks of pigeons, sparrows and starlings to the block of flats where she lives by throwing bread out of her window. Her elderly neighbours complained that the hundreds of birds were a health hazard and exposed them to illness because of their droppings.

Anchor Housing Association, which owns the flats in Weymouth, Dorset, took out a court injunction last year to stop Mrs Simpson feeding the birds. It had even put a mesh up at her windows in an attempt to stop her feeding the birds.

The housing association took her to a county court to repossess her flat, but she was reprieved by the judge on condition that she agreed to stop feeding the birds.

After she returned from court she was filmed by a private investigator hired by the housing association pushing bread through the mesh as birds perched on the window sill.

The association reapplied for an eviction order at a county court, and a judge has now upheld the application, describing Mrs Simpson as "a thorough nuisance to her neighbours".

Mrs Simpson now has two weeks to leave her home and will have to find bed and breakfast accommodation.

This is the lady I referred to, whom Weymouth and Portland Borough Council's officers were responsible for starting the process, 4 years ago that ended in this lady being sent to Holloway Prison. The council will now have to find a home for her and will no doubt continue to make her life a misery. Bed and breakfast will be the option as she is considered by our council to have made herself homeless. By feeding the birds!

Subject: RE: BS: Our Feathered Friends
From: gnu
Date: 26 Jan 03 - 07:41 AM

The Keekee birds in my backyard are all froze solid. Poor little things couldn't take the overnight lows of -20C. Figured something was wrong as I hadn't lately heard their soft plaintive cries... kee kee keeRIST IT'S COLD.