I used to leave my bird feeders up year-round but last summer the squirrels crossed the line when they started snapping off my daylily scapes. At first I wasn’t sure what was causing the damage, but in late summer I caught a squirrel in the act. He was using a scape to climb higher off the ground in hopes of jumping past the baffle onto one of my bird feeders. Once a daylilies’ scapes are gone, they are done blooming for the year. Some attempt to rebloom, but it doesn’t happen a lot this far north. In fact I have one sending up a new scape right now, but considering the weather people are warning of a possible frost tonight and again Friday night, the chances of that daylily blooming again this season are slim to none.
This spring I made the decision to take the feeders down for the summer months. I actually lost sleep making up my mind about it. I love to birdwatch, and in the spring I get an amazing variety of songbirds—birds that I learned about in elementary school but never saw unless I went to a state park. My neighborhood has a beautiful canopy of oaks that attracts tanagers, buntings, warblers, grosbeaks and other colorful birds every spring. I didn’t want to miss the opportunity to see them up close by taking down my feeders, but the daylily scapes were getting taller and taller and time was running out.
I surrendered in late May, the same time I planted my annuals in the flower beds. I figured it would also encourage the chipmunks and voles to go elsewhere for the summer so they wouldn’t be digging holes in my flower beds or uprooting plants like some of them love to do. The experiment was a great success. I didn’t lose a single daylily scape this summer, and my gardens were left virtually undisturbed by critters until late August when the hickory and acorn nuts started ripening (I can’t do anything about that!). I must admit I cheated a little by moving one of my covered platform feeders to the front yard. It didn’t attract a lot birds because my front yard is on a bus route on a busy street and there are always people or vehicles going by, but every once in awhile I’d see a woodpecker or cardinal snatching a seed from it and that made me feel better.
One benefit of taking down the feeders is that birds nested in two different shrubs in my yard this summer. I suppose the feeders were gone so they felt the area was safer from other birds and animals. I didn’t notice that goldfinches built a nest outside my office window until they had already fledged. Although they certainly dropped a big hint. Every morning for about a week in June, a male would startle me by fiercely tapping on the bay window nearby. I’m guessing he was fighting his reflection. I also had a pair of cardinals build a nest outside my kitchen window, but that’s a story for another day.
Two weeks ago I couldn’t stand it any longer and put up one feeder. I was amazed at the number of birds that visited and how happy it made me to be able to watch them again. This week I put up three more, and today I went to Wild Birds Unlimited and got enough birdseed to last me until January. I’m officially open for business!