Earlier this year, one of the local hardware shops had a sale on suet feeders and suet. As I had been curious about bird feeders for a while, I bought a feeder, a few packs of suet, and set it up on the balcony. Unfortunately, this happened around late January, so the feeder sat idle for months (I did replace the suet though). Over Spring, it got its first visitors: a couple of Downy woodpeckers, who have since became regulars - suet success! In fact, the male woodpecker has been very regular, usually showing up early in the morning, again around lunch, and one last time before sunset.
A few months later, we got a hopper feeder, which is sitting on the top shelf of a greenhouse. Thanks to this, we started attracting a few new visitors, which prompted me to setup a camera by the window and connect it to a raspi running motion. After sifting through a bunch of false positives, I got some photos of some of the birds we had seen stopping by: mostly house sparrows, and two other regulars (a couple of northern cardinals).
The camera also caught a much rarer visitor—or at least one we hadn’t seen directly—a tufted titmouse.
The peanuts are a recent addition: on a recent rainy day, after seeing wet birds stopping by for food, I put some shelled peanuts next to the hopper, which attracted a new kind of visitor (and the occasional morning alarm clock): blue jays!
I had heard these guys chasing ravens away, but this was the first time I had seen (and heard them) from so close (they are quite loud). The only other bird which I have seen but didn’t yet capture is the house finch. Having the feeders has been interesting in that regard: growing up, it was rare to see birds other than sparrows, pigeons and seagulls; it has been surprising to see this kind of diversity in an urban setting.
Note: As the feeder is just outside the window (which helps prevent window strikes) I’m using a GoPro clone on a suction cup mount. This camera works great because of the wide-angle lens; unfortunately, the rear screen stays on the whole time the camera is powered on, and the effects of burn-in are starting to show.