Subject: suet feeders
Date: Dec 14 17:54:31 2003
From: C. Anderson - christyrae at hotmail.com


Diane, I have my suet basket hanging from a slender pole fitted with a
squirrel baffle. It's the kind that looks like a section of stove pipe
encircling the pole. When the squirrel climbs the pole, he soon finds
himself inside the"stovepipe" and can't get any further. The baffle needs to
be high enough off the ground that he can't leap on top of it, and the pole
far enough from trees that they can't jump from the trees either. I have
only had 1 squirrel in twelve years manage to get around the baffle, and
when I raised it higher, he could no longer jump up on top of it. Now the
squirrels are reduced to cleaning up what the birds drop on the ground!

My main suet marauders are crows and starlings. But they can't cling to the
basket for very long, so they soon tire of the effort and leave for easier
pickings. The only time of year I have trouble with starlings is when they
are feeding babies. Then, they will even eat from the upside down "starling
proof" feeder!

I get my suet from the store of the local Audubon chapter, in my case, East
Lake Washington in Kirkland. They are maybe a little higher than chain
stores, but I know the money is going to a good cause, and it's more
convenient than running all over town looking for the lowest price. I also
know they use a local source for suet and it hasn't been shipped around the
world wasting fuel.

Christy Anderson
christyrae at hotmail.com
Bellevue WA

----- Original Message -----
From: "Diann MacRae" <tvulture at vei.net>
To: <Tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Sent: Sunday, December 14, 2003 11:23 AM
Subject: suet feeders


> Hi, Tweets
>
> I'm curious, in regard to all you feeders of copious amounts of suet:
don't
> you have squirrels? In my yard (it's heavily forested here), I have pole
> guards plus the domed clear plastic covers for almost all of my feeders.
It
> gets expensive. My one suet feeder, which is an old-fashioned net bag from
> the produce department filled with beef suet, has an overhead "dome" since
> it's hanging from a tree limb. My only other suet-type feeder hangs from
> the eaves, but has morphed into a flying squirrel feeder. That's okay, but
> I have a healthy band of at least a dozen grey squirrels, not to mention
> the native Douglas squirrels, and all will, as you all know, get into
> anything they can.
>
> My question: what do you do to protect your suet from squirrels? Perhaps
> others have methods I haven't thought of or tried.
>
> Cheers, Diann
>
>
>
>
>
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