It is a mystery

The weather over the weekend can be described with one word, gorgeous.  We had sunny skies and temps in the mid 70’s. In fact our winter has not really materialized this year, which is ok by me. Oh, and it was Super Bowl Sun.  Hope your team won.  I really didn’t care one way or the other although, I did enjoy the game.  Judy was pulling for the NY Giants, mostly because she doesn’t care too much for the NE Patriot's coach.  

Now for the mystery.  Each winter season I maintain a few bird feeders.  Over the past few weeks the “Shepherd’s hook” that I hang two feeders and a cake of suet on has been bent down to the ground.  The damage required that I manually straighten the shaft so it could be used.  This has happened three times. Sorry I didn’t take any pics.

I have been thinking “what can be causing this damage."  The usual suspects came to mind. They include squirrels, geese, and deer. The more I thought about it, I could not rationalized any of these bending the shepherd’s hook shaft so severely.  I could not imagine a squirrel or a goose even knocking it over.  A deer could easily knock it over but not bend it down.

Then I got a lead!  The last time it happened I noticed that the “suet cake” and its container was off of the hook. Gone, vanished. The container was not on the ground. That changed my mindset about the suspects.  All of my suspects would have just eaten the contents there.  The question now, how to finger the culprit?

This perplexed me for over a week or so. Then out of the blue, I thought of my brother-in law, Mike.  He is the kind of guy that hunts and fishes a lot. I said to Judy, “I bet Mike has a wildlife camera.”  I gave him a call and confirmed my hunch.  Sure enough he had not one but two!  He told me to come and get one.  It is operational day or night. The camera operates in an "IR" mode at night.  I have it mounted on the predator guard on my Purple Martin house pole. The feeder is about 12 feet away.

                                                                    The Camera

                                                                              The Feeder

So I will be setting it up tonight. I don’t know how long it will take for the vandal to return but I will be ready. You can bet that I will be letting you know as soon as I know.

Don’t forget to stop by and see how this mystery ends! If you think you know what has been causing the problems or would like to offer a guess write a comment.  If you visit often, add to your” favs or bookmark”.

Welcome to new follower(s); Charlie and Phil and Rudee at Workin' RVers
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