As I mentioned before, on Christmas Eve we put strands of popcorn onto our outdoor tree for the birds in our neighbourhood to enjoy. The birds, and probably the squirrels, ate the popcorn in 24 hours! The girls and I decided that we want to try and help out the animals that stay in our neigbourhoods during the winter. We found our first project idea from my friend Amanda. Amanda left a comment on our popcorn post;
"Another bird friendly tip that my mom does every year is putting the Christmas tree out next to her feeder (provided it's real of course) for a few weeks to give them a new perch and hiding spot to have fun in! With the cold weather it tends to stay green for quite awhile. "
In our backyard we have a plant hanging hook that I usually hang a birdfeeder from in the winter. We can see the hook from the kitchen window. Unfortunately, I fill that feeder once and then forget all about it. Sorry birds. This year we have taken Amanda's advice and we moved our Christmas tree from the indoors to the outdoors.
We placed it right beside the hook. We anchored it to the fence and the hook using fishing line.
Now the birds can come and feed from our suet feeder and rest in the shelter of our tree. I picked up our suet feeder from our local grocery store. Suet is used to feed insect eating birds, it is made from beef fat, seeds and corn.
The best part is we can watch the birds from our kitchen window. We might even add some of our popcorn strands to the tree. We'll keep an eye on our feeder and see who comes to visit. The girls and I are hoping for Blue Jays and Cardinals...I will report back!
Do you put out feed in the winter? What do you do with your Christmas tree when Christmas is over?
Alissa @ Creative With Kids says
At my mom's house we put the tree outside until it's nice and dry and then have a bon fire with it! It's beautiful, but a little scary to see how crazy flammable it becomes 😉
KitchenCounterChronicles says
That sounds amazing Alissa...and totally illegal in my tiny city backyard! Ha! Thanks for stopping by.
Brooke @ Let Kids Create says
Great idea, I'm sure you'll see a lot of wildlife out there. A couple years ago, we invested in a (gasp) fake tree. Now I see this and of course want one. Maybe I can snag one off the street that someone has thrown out ;-).
Thanks for sharing on Monday Madness.
Mama Pea Pod says
Oh, I love this post! We will definitely do this next year! (Our tree is already gone, and I don't suppose the neighbours in our apartment building would appreciate it anyway). One of the things I'm most looking forward to about moving to our own house is having the freedom to set up things in the garden. We've already bought a lovely bird feeder for the new house even though we don't move until the end of February 😉 Thanks for linking up to the Outdoor Play Party! Can't wait to hear if you get a lot of feathered (or furry!) visitors to it!
Laura @Art For Little Hands says
I have a fake tree and I don't feed the birds in the winter. I love feeding birds, but I hate the cold. Our poor bird feeders, and we have about 7 of them, are all empty right now. Our birds eat them in a couple days time so in the winter I tend to forget about them since we are not out playing.
abbie says
I LOVE this idea! Wish I would have found this before we put our tree out for the yard clean up folks. Rats. It would have been a great addition to our bird feeding area.
Thanks for linking this up and sharing the idea with all the outdoor play folks out there!
Amanda says
So cool! I didn't know you did this! I'll have to let my Mom know she has started a trend! 🙂