My Spring project this year is I'm going to try building a hanging bird feeder down at our get-away cabin. At first my husband was skeptical, but now that I have a plan, he thinks it just might work for me. We have lots of American Cardinals down there that nest in and feed on our Yaupon Holly bushes and berries. When we bought the place 2 years ago, I found a cylindrical metal screen mesh in the barn. It has a contiguous bottom and I think it is an old chimney cap of some sort. It's about 10" in diameter. Clearly there is a screen top sitting on the cabin fireplace, so this was another one or is something else entirely.
I plan to slide a large piece of 6" PVC pipe inside (cut to length) to force the sunflower seeds (cardinals' favorites) and bits of suet to the outer edges of the cylinder. The cardinals should be able to grab the mesh and eat from the cylinder vertically. At least that is my hope. I found a cheap metal ceiling light shade at a rummage sale for a lid. My husband is going to drill 2 small holes into two sides so I can wire it on top for a lid to 1) hopefully keep squirrels out and 2) allow seed replenishing with ease. We don't see many squirrels down there because of a preponderance of hungry hawks 3 x daily. I'm hoping with the entire apparatus swinging from the tree limb outside our dining room seating area, any squirrel cheeky enough to jump on it will slide right off, as it is quite sloped and painted slick on the surface. I may rig up a sort of metal pie tin base onto the bottom of the cage so those feathered friends that prefer to eat standing can do so. I'll be sure to post a photo of the finished project when I get around to making/finishing it.