December 6, 2011 - Cold, but no snow - I'm sorry, but I like it!  I finally decided the Big Feeder had been empty and neglected long enough (I miss seeing all the critters that came to it.)  So I decided to build a replacement.  It's very similar, but I tried to make it easier to fill and tried to make it a little better than the original.  It's been quadruple the amount of work I intended, but I'm having fun with it.  I hope to get it up this week and already have about 120# of seed to put in it.

I finally filled my little Mason jar feeder and in less than 20 minutes the birds were flocking around it.  Yeah, the squirrels found it too.  It wouldn't be so bad if the little guys wouldn't chew holes in the big wood feeder.  Of course that's better than the bears, they're the reason I'm having to build a new feeder.  I'm hoping they won't like this one!  I was watching the birds this afternoon and three tom turkeys came walking up out of the edge of the swamp and over to the little feeder.  See - that's what I've been missing!  I already took the old feeder down and dug around the big tree post to try and lessen it's similarity to the Leaning Tower of Pisa.  It's not easy with the ground freezing now.  I have to admit I like being about to look out the window of the studio and actually see the back yard area.  But, I prefer to watch the wildlife so I'll put the new feeder back on that upside down cedar tree support as soon as I can.

I'll post some pictures of the feeder here soon.  I've made 20,387 trips from the basement (to work where it's warm) to the garage (where I keep my table saw) while working on the feeder.  Okay, that's not an exact count, it might even be way off, in fact it's probably twice that (or so it seems.)

December 12, 2011 - Still no snow and 35 this morning.  A few days ago I finally got the old Big Feeder taken down and the new on put up on the post.  It was quite a job carrying in two pieces out of the basement and even more of a challenge getting it up on the upside down cedar tree post by myself.  It now has 100# of black sunflower seeds and 20# of thistle seed.  It only took a few minutes for the birds and squirrels to find it and the fresh supply of food. The last couple of days the turkeys have been coming in to feed on the spilled seed that is below the feeder.  We've had 12 so far.  Just enough that I managed to step in "it" and track it into the house.  Of course Sue loves it when that happens and is kind enough to let me clean it up.  OK, I had to insist and promise I would do it.

December 21, 2011 - I was just working on the computer this morning and heard a few turkeys purring and clucking.  I wasn't surprised as there have been two hens hanging around the base of the feeder the several days.  But the volume of chatter picked up and became quite loud.  So, I rose up out of my chair and peeked out the window.  There were 18 turkeys and three toms in full display.  The toms were strutting around and then started gobbling.  Then the calls got really loud and it was really noisy.