If you have been following me for a while, you will know I sometimes use cheap kitchen utensils for weird & wonderful projects in the garden! This ladle feeder worked well…..
I found that whisks are a super and cheap resource that can also be used for the birds in the garden! One way is that you can use them to hold a fat ball or bar…..
My most favourite way of using whisks, however, is at this time of year, when I use them as nesting material dispenser! It is a really easy activity to do (especially fun with kids!) Why not have a go yourself this weekend… and tweet your images to me on Twitter @katemacrae.
Any sort of whisks work fine as a nesting dispenser. These were cheap ones from Wilkos, but I have used all sorts of both balloon whisks and ball whisks. You may even have an old one that you never use in the kitchen drawer! You can also use bird feeders… the wire sorts that are designed to hold fat balls or fat bars work best.
Simply collect a range of suitable materials to pop in your whisks. I have found that the best things are moss, dried grass, hay or straw, sheep wool, hair from your hairbrush…. or even better, give your cat or dog a brush and pop that in. By far the most popular last year was Bryn’s fur which he kindly donated! All my blue tit and great tit nests were lined with it!
You can then hang the whisks up, or press them into the lawn so birds such as blackbirds or dunnocks can collect. Species such as this find it hard to hang on the whisks. You could try separating the materials to see which is most popular…..
You can also mount them on fences…
I also tried cable-tying four fat bar feeders together to create a quad and packed each with different materials. I set the Bushnell on it so I could see what took advantage of the materials!
The blue tits also loved the Balloon whisk from IKEA!….
Get out this weekend and make your own!
