Bird Feeders - One Way to Recycle Your Plastic Containers

You know you go through all sorts of plastic containers. Put aside a couple of them and make some bird feeders with your children. They were a lot easier to make than I thought and it is a lot of fun to watch the birds outside your windows. It is a real conversation starter with my children! I will note that I cannot take credit for coming up with the idea for making these...it was all my husband!


What You Need:

• Clean plastic container including the lids (milk, juice, applesauce, etc.)
• Wire hanger (one hanger can be used for 2 bird feeders)
• Wooden dowel (we bought one from the store and cut it down into 3 pieces)
• Bird Seed
• Knife or sharp scissors
• Basic tools, pliers and hammer (we mainly used a Leatherman)
• Nail
• Bird Seed 

Directions:

First, cut a holes in the side of the container big enough for a bird to get in and low enough that the bird can get the seeds inside (about 1.5 - 2 inches from the bottom - make sure there is room for the dowel to go through the plastic underneath the hole). You can add another hole on the other side for variety.

Next, cut a small slit in the plastic about 1/2 inch below the hole that was just cut. Make another one on the other side and then push the dowel through the 2 slits.

The OJ container has 2 holes in it.

Now, you are almost done. All you have to do now is poke 2 holes into the lid with the nail (using the hammer).

This is the lid for the applesauce container.

Cut the wire hanger in half. I actually learned that my Leatherman can do this! Just open it to the pliers and then place the wire inside the pliers as close as you can get to your hands and there is the wire cutter (I hope that made sense and I'm sure there is a better way to describe that). 


Fold the wire in half and insert it through the holes in the lid so the bend is on the top of the lid. Then twist the wire a couple of times under the lid. Make sure you leave some wire on top so you can hang the feeder where you want. We discovered that there is a bar in our rain gutter so we looped the wire around it and then inserted it into the lid and twisted the wire under the lid so that the bird feed will have a secure hold outside.

Then screw the lid onto the container. (You may have to cut the wire under the lid a little shorter if it is too long inside the container). Now, the bird feeder is ready to be hung outside.

We added 2 dowels and only 1 hole for the applesauce container.

You can hang your feeder outside from a hook, nail, tree limb, rain gutter, etc. We chose to hang our bird feeders near a window so we could see the birds. 

Don't forget to add some bird seed!



Updated:

Here are the pictures I promised of the bird feeders from outside...

We also attached one to the back fence!

Have fun!