Bird Watching: Show Us Your Feeders, vol. #16, 1 by dyzzypyxxy

dyzzypyxxy wrote:
Hi all, nice pictures. Hope you don't mind a question here.

My feeder has been very active all spring and summer with cardinals, titmice, red-belly woodpeckers, blue jays, lots of sparrows and warblers. Just recently I noticed the birds are much more scarce and the ones that come are very wary.

Turns out there is a hawk in the neighborhood preying on the songbirds, and of course my yard is happy hunting ground with the feeder here. I surprised him with a loudly squawking blue jay in his talons yesterday, and scared him off enough that he dropped the jay and skedaddled. Jay was ok enough to fly away. Small hawk about 1ft. tall, reddish brown and white sort of stripey.

Anyway, I'm not so concerned with the type of hawk as I am with possibly providing more cover for the little birds so they can continue to come to the feeder. It is about 8ft. away from a huge stand of bamboo that provides good cover, but I'm wondering if I should maybe prune some branches from my (very prickly) bougainvillea or something, and festoon the top of the feeder with them? Anybody have suggestions? I can't put the feeder any closer to the bamboo or the squirrels will jump to the feeder too easily.

thx Elaine