My first bird feeder
Over the next few months, I will be adding posts on feeding birds here in the north central part of the country. I plan on sharing my years of experience with different types of bird feeders, bird seed and ways to get the most out of this activity.
Before I begin down that path, I want to talk about my first bird feeder, a Droll Yankee A-6F tube feeder that my parents bought for me in the early 70’s. This feeder was uniquely revolutionary for bird feeding as the Peterson field guides were for bird identification. It absolutely was a game-changer for making bird feeding easy and user-friendly creating a boom in attracting backyard birds. Unlike the bulky and rustic-looking wooden feeders of the time, the A-6F tube feeder could be hung from tree branches and did not need a pole to anchor it. The feeder’s modern, lightweight design and the ability to showcase the song birds grabbing the seed from its metal perches made it an instant favorite. Having all six perches occupied by goldfinches or redpolls created visual excitement that was unique to this design. One can still buy this same feeder 50 years later as well as many other additional models that Droll Yankee created over the year building on that initial success.
Even as other companies created their own tube feeder design, I continue to stay loyal to the Droll Yankee line. I have always liked the quality of the materials and the fact that they are made in the USA. Some of my Droll Yankees I have had over for 30 years. The metal parts last forever (can take a lot of squirrel abuse) and I have only had to get new plastic tubes because they yellowed or squirrels damaged them. Good retail bird stores will recycle spare metal parts from old feeders to give customers who are missing a piece. The feeders are so easy to refurbish thus having a very permanent, reusable nature about them versus the disposable stuff that so permeates our life today. If only more products could be made like that.
Lastly behind these special feeders was a special person who invented the revoluntary best seller. Peter Kilham, a Rhode Island yankee, was an inventor, artist, music engineer as well as a passionate observer of backyard nature. If you want to get a measure of this man, watch this 6 minute video about his bird inventions. His persistence, ingenuity, humor and experiential knowledge of nature all combined to make the man who made a great product!