Beautiful Bird Nests Made From Gourds

In last year's August 18 post, "The Yadkin Yard is a Good Garden Yard - Part 2", we showed how well the gourds (among other plants) were growing all over the place.

So now after storing them during the winter, Farmer Lynn has made birdhouses out of a lot of them.

He sands the gourds smooth by hand with a medium sandpaper. Then he cuts a hole in them to scrape the seeds out and to  have a door for the future tenets. Then he hangs the gourds up and spray paints them with an outdoor clear paint.

They're just the coolest things!  The birds are really enjoying them.

Downstairs Cat is, of course, fascinated with this whole bird nest / bird activity process! From nest building by Farmer Lynn, and nest building by birds just outside his door and window. Spring brought new wonder to this curious little fellow...

Another of these is over in eastern NC at my daughter's (blogger TallGirl) house now -- I'll be going there soon and will check on any occupants!

Farmer Lynn hung up several of the bird houses around the north and east sides of the house.  They look nice and blend in with the natural area there. They get lots of welcome visitors. But the one that got the
the most interest was a bird so inspired by the gourd house design, it didn't wait for completion before it chose its gourd. A cracked gourd on the table Farmer Lynn was doing his gourd thing on. A wren built a nest and three baby birds was hatched, fed, raised, and flew from that gourd and it stayed on the table (much to the delight and interest of Downstairs Cat, whose window onto the baby birds is on the upper left of this picture!) Farmer Lynn didn't want to tear up the nest or move it when he spotted it, so he  "worked around" it until the family was out...