With autumn well on it’s way, now’s the perfect time to show your flying friends a little bit of extra love and make the perfect bird feeder! These easy bird feeders are a great way to enjoy the last of the warmer weather, plus they’re really simple to make too. All of these bird feeders were made by my kids who are 3 and 6 with only a little bit of help needed from me where things like a knife were needed.
Easy Bird Feeder 1: Upcycled bottle bird feeder
To make this easy bird feeder you will need an empty, clean bottle, garden string, scissors, two wooden spoons or pencils and of course some bird feed.
Using the scissors we made four holes in the sides of the drink bottle, two near the bottom and two half way up and then pushed the wooden spoons through from one side to the other. You will need to make sure the holes are plenty big enough for the seed to be able to get out so give the spoons a good wiggle! We then filled the bottle with bird seed and tied the string around the neck of the bottle so that we could hang it up.
Easy Bird Feeder 2: Egg box bird feeder
This egg box feeder is super simple to make but was really popular with the birds in our garden. Being made out of cardboard means it won’t last forever but I’m a great fan of anything you can make out of the contents of your recycling bin! My kids carefully tore the lid and closing tab from a cardboard egg box and then we used a bit of string knotted at each end to make a loop we could hang it up with. Our egg box had holes already in the box which we used but if yours doesn’t you could easily make some holes yourself using a pencil or scissors. All that’s left to do is add the bird seed!
Easy Bird Feeder 3: Orange bird feeders
As simple, as these easy bird feeders are, they required a bit more help from me as I used a sharp knife to cut the oranges in half. I think of all the bird feeders we made these were the first to be visited by the birds in our garden, and while we were making them we had a very inquisitive little robin hop up beside us to see what we were doing and try to hurry us along!
After cutting the oranges in half we scooped out all the fruit and tried to get rid of as much of the juice as we could using metal spoons. Using a sharp knife I made a whole in each side and then we fed some garden string through these tying a knot at each end to make a loop that we could hang our bird feeders up from. If your’re not super careful with this the feeders can get a bit lopsided so you could make an additional loop to even it up or rest it slightly on a branch below if you need to. Once you have tied the ends of the string just fill the bird feeders with your seed and they are finished.
Fancy trying a few more creative bird feeder designs? Here are 7 DIY bird feeder ideas by gardening specialists Sloane & Sons.
if you’re looking for more indoor fun, have a look at our 100 great indoor activities!