Hello All, I thought I would share something with you all. I have been having trouble for months keeping the squirrels out of my bird feeders. No matter what I have tried with my feeders, the squirrels get to them. I stopped feeding for the summer and I have just recently put one feeder out again and of course, the squirrels who went away when the feeders came down were right back when the feeder went up. I tried getting one of those shepherds crooks thinking they wouldn't be able to climb it. Well, I was wrong. They were able to go right up. Then I remembered what a friend did to deter the squirrels. She had a wire that went from a tree to her house. The wire was strung through empty plastic soda bottles. She hung her feeders between the bottles and the squirrels could not walk to them without falling off. What I did was a bit different. I still wanted to use this hook that I had spent $20.00 on so I decided to take the soda bottles (2 liter) and cut the top and bottom off and place them over the hook and down the pole. I have them going almost all the way to the hook part. So far so good. The squirrels have tried to climb the feeder but the bottles are slippery, noisy and unstable and not good for climbing. I bought a short cheap feeder so the squirrels can't jump up and hold on to the bottom of it. Instead of filling my feeder daily, I am now filling it two to three a week. I was afraid I wouldn't get to feed the birds this year because it was getting so expensive but now I can. I will be putting up another feeder with thistle soon. To see a picture of this feeder, you can go to my blog at http://emeraldsnaturepics.blogspot.com/ Have a great day! Anne **************************************************************** To post messages, send e-mail to: [log in to unmask] Set your e-mail application to PLAIN TEXT ONLY to post messages. To contact the list owner: [log in to unmask] ---------------------------------------------------------------- Web based archives and subscription management are available at: http://listserv.dartmouth.edu/Archives/uv-birders.html ****************************************************************