Upcycled bird feeder

Bring the birds into your garden with this recycled bird feeder craft activity. If you build it, they will come.

What you need:

• 1 litre milk or juice carton
• white paint
• 2 x water bottle lids
• 2 x googly craft eyes
• craft knife
• lead pencil
• glue
• small pieces of yellow and black card
• 2 x popsicle sticks

Number of players:

Activity:

First you'll need to paint your milk carton white. You might need a few coats, so leave enough time for each coat to dry.

Once the white paint is dry, mark up the carton with a lead pencil.

Mark up a small arched window shape (about 8cm high, 3.5cm wide) in the bottom of the front of the carton. This is where the birds will get access to the seed.

Turn the carton side on and mark up a wing.  Do the same on the opposite side.

Cut those sections, so that you have two flappy wings and a window for the birdseed. (See video)

Now glue the two bottle lids, with the flat side facing the carton, to the front of the carton.  Glue one googly eye into the centre of each lid.

Cut a black triangle for the beak.

Cut a crest shape out of the yellow cardboard.

Stick those on.

Now make a small slit in the front with your craft knife, just beneath the birdseed window. Push one popsicle stick through that slit for a bird perch.

To counterbalance the perch, you will need another popsicle stick running crossways and overlapping over the top of the first popsicle stick. (To stop the perch stick flipping up like a see saw when a bird lands on it. 

Mark where the counterbalance stick will go in on the sides of the carton and make two slits to wedge the counterbalance stick crossways.

Now fill your feeder with birdseed and wait …