At the ball park a treasured memory is the guy hiking up and down the steps of the grandstand pitching salted-in-the shell ballpark peanuts. In my view the perfect game day snack. Just thirst-provoking enough to justify a frosty beer and easy enough to eat because you can leave the shells on the concrete beneath your seat for someone else to clean-up.
In any event, after consulting with my pal and mutual bird aficionado, Braumeister, I invested in this contraption.
It's spring-loaded device for holding unsalted peanuts in the shell for song birds. Namely blue jays and other peanut-centric birds. I picked it up at the local bird food supply outlet in Sturgeon Bay, primed it with a generous dose of peanuts and hung it from a maple tree in the yard by means of a raccoon-proof length of army surplus braided metal parachute rigging. (At least I think it will be raccoon proof.)Days passed and aside from an occasional curious chickadee nobody was acknowledging the presence of my bird-world ballpark peanuts. Days turned into a week without a single customer. At that point I reached-out to my buddy to inquire as to what might be the problem. He cautioned patience.
The next day, sure as shooting, there was a blue jay on the feeder pecking-away at my peanuts to break the shell and extract a nut. At which point the bird would fly-off, disappear to likely stash the prize in a food cache. Jays do that. In reasonably short order the word went forth and every day there have been jays hammering-away at the peanuts. Once and a while a chickadee or nuthatch might give it a passing sniff - but only jays have been actively feeding.
Braumeister says to be patient as other species will naturally become attracted and join-in the ever-growing bird buffet in our yard.
Peaaanuts! Get Your Peanuts!
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