“As you age, it’s ridiculous how fast bird-watching creeps up on you. You spend your whole life being 100% indifferent to birds, and then one day you’re like, ‘Damn, is that a Yellow-rumped Warbler?’”
Jesse Case nailed it. It happens suddenly and without warning. One day you’re sniggering at the bloke in the flat cap with binoculars the size of Pringle tubes, and the next you’re on the RSPB website at midnight muttering, “I swear that was a nuthatch.”
We spend our twenties ignoring anything with feathers that isn’t fried or in our duvet. Then, somewhere in your thirties, something shifts. Could be having a garden. Might be the kids. Maybe it’s the slow, delicious unravelling of our minds.
But suddenly you’re at the kitchen window, bino’s in hand, whispering, “Come on, you beautiful bastard,” at a robin.
And that’s when you realise you’ve crossed the line. The ‘Warbler Moment’. You’re no longer a man: you’re a bird guy. A binocular dad. The transformation is complete.
So how do we share this passion prematurely with our kids?
Well you could watch another Planet Earth episode, or take them to the zoo or drop five grand trekking through Papua New Guinea to glimpse the iridescent fluff-tailed bongo-puffin…
Or you could spend ten minutes turning a plastic bottle into a bird feeder with your kids, then sit there like a full-blown nature perv, cuppa in hand, notebook ready, waiting for the carnage to begin.
Here are three gloriously easy and low-tech ways to turn your garden or balcony into a five-star feathered frenzy, and maybe, just maybe, awaken your inner birder in the process.
1. The Plastic Bottle Feeder
You’ll need:
A clean plastic bottle (with cap)
Two sticks or old pencils
A pin
Scissors
Some string
Birdseed
How to:
Puncture a few drainage holes in the base of the bottle. This stops your bird buffet turning into a mouldy soup.
Make two level holes near the bottom and push a stick through for perches. Leave about 5 cm either side - birds need elbow room too.
Just above each perch, cut a feeding hole about the size of a small coin. This is the drive-through window.
Repeat the process higher up the bottle, rotated 90° so the second set of diners can’t glare at the first.
Make two small holes in the neck, thread the string through, and find somewhere the cat / fox / squirrels can’t reach.
Fill with seed, screw the cap back on, hang it up and step away slowly.
Then the waiting begins. Sometimes it takes a few days. Sometimes they arrive within minutes, like they’ve been watching you from the hedge thinking, “Finally, he’s done something useful.”
2. The Apple Feeder
You’ll need:
An apple (preferably not half-eaten)
A bit of string
Two sticks (twigs / chopsticks)
A handful of sunflower seeds, oats, or similar
How to:
Core the apple. We used a metal straw which worked a charm.
Thread the string through the hole and make an ‘X’ with the sticks underneath so the apple sits proudly on top.
Poke seeds into the apple’s skin until it looks like a cheerful Hellraiser
Hang it up somewhere visible (and in 3 weeks it’ll look like it belongs in Ed Gein’s basement)
3. Fruit Hoops
You’ll need:
A bit of wire (garden wire or an old coat hanger works)
String
A few cubes of apple, grapes, raisin and cheese
How to:
Cut everything into small cubes
Thread the fruit and cheese onto the wire like a necklace. Mix it up - birds appreciate variety, even if they have no idea what cheese is.
Bend the wire into a hoop, twist the ends together, and tie a bit of string to hang it from a branch.
The Feathered Payoff
You might spot a chaffinch speed-dating, or the relentless shapes thrown by an over-eager wren.
But while you and the kids are pressed against the window, narrating every flutter like junior Attenboroughs, something else quietly happens: they start noticing.
That’s the real win here.
You think you’re feeding birds, but really, you’re feeding curiosity.
And the world could use a bit more of that.
