Bob Sanders: My money has gone to the birds

By: Bob Sanders Columnist | Opelika Auburn News
Published: June 15, 2009

Help! I need some help from people in the very exclusive Prestige Plaza subdivision about feeding birds.

I am apparently feeding every bird within a five-lock area. They’re breaking me. Finally got a bird feeder that is, up to now (they’ll probably solve it) squirrelproof. But word got out amongst the birds. I’m having to refill every day, and I’m talking about sunflower seed. Expensive. I could use one of the cheaper mixes, filled with millet and such; but they just rake that out to get to the occasional sunflower seed. So no gain there.

Basically, I’m a laissez-faire conservative when it comes to feeding birds.

There are worms and insects and seeds out there. Go out and find them. However, for purely selfish reasons, I feed them, just so I can see them up close. I never tire of watching them chomp away. Just wanted you to know, birds, that it’s just for my own entertainment that you’re getting these wonderful meals.

Growing up in Frontier Country, I of course knew many birds by sight. But there were a bunch of them that we called just grass birds.

I got serious about bird watching with purple martins.

I put up a martin house in our back yard, and they came for a few years. But trees grew up around it, and they don’t like that

Then one day, I asked Charles Jernigan, known as something of an expert on birds, about those “grass” birds.

He sneered at my ignorance and said there were no such things as “grass” birds, that they were various sparrows and such.

He directed me to buy a Peterson’s bird book, which I did, and became, if not an expert, a pretty good amateur bird watcher.

He also told me that prostrate gland cases were very rare in Lee County. Odd. They were very common in Lamar County.

And when I whined that I wished I owned part of something, he arranged for me to buy five shares of a company in which he had some influence. Nearly broke me, buy, by George, I was a stockholder. Thanks, Charlie.

But I digress.

Birds are going through my sunflower seeds at such an alarming rate I have to refill every da. Regular customers include chickadees, various sparrows, titmice, nuthatches, woodpeckers and the occasional exotic, rose-breasted grosbeak. I wrench (Lamar County for “rinse”) out the birdbath every day, too.

I hope you birds appreciate what I’m doing for you, but I didn’t take you to raise.

Get out and find some stuff on your own. Otherwise, I may have to sell my five shares.

Bob Sanders is a longtime radio personality with WAUD in Auburn and writes a weekly column for the Opelika-Auburn News.