We have made these birdseed cakes a few times, because we love to feed and watch the birds in our garden, and it’s a fun little task the kids can do with minimal supervision, other than dealing with the hot fat.
This is great to do in autumn when the birds might need a bit of extra feeding to help them but we make them all year round and hang them in the garden to see which birds come to visit and have a snack.
You can use vegetable fat or lard, whichever you prefer. I don’t like the smell of lard at all, so we use vegetable fat. You can get this from the supermarket, or if you are very thrifty, save your fat when you cook meat, until you have enough.
This is a cheap and easy project too. Bird see you can get from most supermarkets in the pet section these days, or even the pet store, and our local hardware store sells it too.
You need:
twelve cupcake cases
a muffin tin tray
500g or so of good quality bird seed
500g of fat in solid form.
String, twelve pieces cut into about 25cm lengths
A pair of scissors
How to:
Melt your fat, either on the stovetop or in the microwave until it’s liquid.
Meanwhile, make a small hole in each cupcake case and thread the string through and tie a knot at the end so it can’t come out.
Place them in the muffin tray holes.
Add your seed to each case. We didn’t really measure, but used 500g of seed and just shared it evenly between the 12 cupcake holders.
Pour the hot fat into each case, carefully, until the seeds are covered.
Leave to cool until solid. Remove from the muffin tray and hang them up in your garden. You remove the cupcake case holders once they are hung up. You also store some of them in an airtight container in the fridge if you don’t want to use them all at once.
The birds in our garden love these birdseed feeders. We need to try and catch some pictures of them having a feast.
Love this as the birds get fed and there’s no stupid plastic nets to deal with as you get on so many commercial fat balls. Great to see Nature getting a helping hand (or claw?!) on #GoingGreen