Backyard bird feeders

One my husband's new hobbies (and I'm not kidding when I say he finds a new hobby every week) is feeding our backyard birds.  He bought a couple bird feeders at the local Orscheln farm store, which we discovered had quite a large selection of bird feeders and seed mixes.

My husband also built his own bird feeder, one that would also be accessible to squirrels, because he enjoys watching the squirrels just as much as the birds! He placed his wooden feeder on top of our burn barrel, which is currently sitting under our big evergreen trees.

It took a couple days before the birds got the courage to come to the feeders.  But once they found it, we've seen all kinds of birds.  The cardinals were the first to arrive.  We've also seen chickadees and woodpeckers. And the squirrels have been at the feeders, too.  We call it squirrel TV, because watching the squirrels is more fun than watching TV!

A fuzzy picture of the cardinal that lives in our backyard.

My husband says the birds really seem to like the black sunflower seeds.  I heard a DNR wildlife specialist on the radio a couple weeks ago who also recommended black sunflower seeds, because the birds really like the fat in their winter diets.  It's really fun to see all the birds in our backyard, especially now when the snow is on the ground.

Do you feed birds in the winter?  What types of birds have you seen in your yard?