I finally got around to turning the wire shelf unit that had held towels in the bathroom for 13 years at 544 into a plant/misc stuff shelf in my bathroom.  It was fucking windy and fairly cold yesterday, but I drilled new holes to move a shelf down, spray-painted the unit gloss white (yay, Rustoleum!) and had P. get three sheets of glass cut to put on the shelves because wire shelves don’t hold narrow objects very well, especially tall cans of Vaseline Spray n’ Go. I’ll probably sand out the few drips I got, trying to hurry, and repaint it, but that won’t happen until spring (if ever!)

I also solved the problem of starlings eating my woodpeckers’/nuthatches’ suet. It was annoying at first, but when P. alerted me to the fact that they were not only eating it, but were actually scaring my little birds away, I’d had enough. Dressed in bright pink star pyjamas, plaid bathrobe and fuzzy aubergine slippers, I went out to the garage. Fuck what the neighbours think. I had a scrap square of 1/2″ plywood, and some scrap 1×4, so I basically made a short board with a roof over it. On one, I stapled the feeder to the board, and on the other, to the underside of the roof. Screwed them to the same Osage orange trees they’d been on so my little dudes wouldn’t have to learn that they were feeders, and watched. The nuthatches and downy woodpeckers don’t seem to mind eating upside down, and the larger redbellies will have an easier time with the vertical feeder, but the starlings can’t sit on top of it and still reach the food because the roof is too wide. There’s nowhere to perch beside it, and they can’t cling to the bark under it like a woodpecker, so they’re out of luck (and food). If they figure out a way, I’ll have to make that an upside-down feeder, too, and if they don’t, then I’ll make the upside-down feeder into just a roofed feeder that’ll be easier for bigger woodpeckers. Either way, no starlings eating all my suet cakes. Fuck starlings.

Speaking of black birds eating all the food, my Redwing Blackbird brought a (male) friend yesterday. I know they flock in winter with other blackbirds and starlings, so maybe the goddamned starlings hanging around brought me something good; I saw a Redwing this afternoon. They’ll eat the sunflower I put out for cardinals, finches, chickadees, titmice and Bloo Jay, but I’ll just buy extra; I love my Redwings!