No red for hummers

[Xena]

I scored a nifty feeder at the native plant sale I went to yesterday. It is just the base, but the base is designed to accept water bottles. So rather than worrying about cleaning up the feeder, I can just reuse water bottles, then give them a quick rinse and put them into curbside recycling. Of course the base has to be cleaned, but still it reduces cleanup by about 50%.

[Hedgerowe]

Xena--I looked for you! So sorry not to have run into you. Did you get any good plants?

[williamf]

Originally Posted by Xena

I scored a nifty feeder at the native plant sale I went to yesterday. It is just the base, but the base is designed to accept water bottles. So rather than worrying about cleaning up the feeder, I can just reuse water bottles, then give them a quick rinse and put them into curbside recycling. Of course the base has to be cleaned, but still it reduces cleanup by about 50%.

That would be a convenience, and probably will work better than our over-reaching try at a similar arrangement.
The bottle part of our large feeders is plastic and is too large to fit on the top shelf of the dishwasher without adjusting the shelf lower than we normally run it. (Soaking them in clorox water is a bother, and it takes more hot water to rinse them to my satisfaction than doing a load of dishes.) We still use the machine to sterilize them every-other filling, but, what with inconvenience being the bane of my life (my eddress is "@comfortable.com"), I was ever on the lookout for a better way.
One day, on the web, I saw an ad for feeder bases that used two-liter soda (pop, soft-drink) bottles. Seemed like a fine idea, and I was delighted to find that, by chance, I suppose, the threads on our feeder bottoms matched a big Coke bottle.
Caution having never had a chance around me, I whipped up a harness out of tie-wire and string that I thought would work like the one in the ad; not pretty, but functional. I filled a bottle with sugar water, screwed on the base, and took it outside (praise be) to hang up.
I walked up to the pole we were using back then, inverted the feeder, hooked the harness to the pole, and stepped back to admire my work.
You all know the principle involved, how atmospheric pressure and the vacuum in an inverted vessel will hold as much as thirty-two feet of water suspended, much to the amazement of small children, so I needn't go into the details. I want only to point out that if the flimsy plastic vessel is in no way actually suited for the purpose the sticky sugar water will squirt out the four sucking-points like miniature fire-hoses until the bottle has completed collapsing in on itself.
I'm sure, though, that a smaller, sturdier bottle, such as a half-liter with a design which envisioned being clutched by desperately thirsty runners, or the square-shaped one-liter Fiji bottle that our Goldie has been using for a car canteen these last few years, will work fine.
Good luck, Wm

[Hedgerowe]

If I can stop laughing I will post my sympathies for your failed experiment--thank you for saving the rest of us from a similar fate by sharing your experience.

[JennyC]

LOL!

I have a "cat waterer" (currently serving as a chicken waterer) that uses a 2-liter bottle and works on that principle, but it keeps a shllow dish filled with water. The water pressure keeps it from becoming a fountain. That might be an option, though I'd hesitate to try to hang the thing up! Maybe an elevated shelf to set it on...

[Xena]

Hedgerowe ... sorry we did not connect. I looked for you too !

So as to not go off topic here, I'll update the "bent Serviceberry" thread with my other purchases.

[Hedgerowe]

Good! I will look for your post, and share my purchases too.

[biigblueyes]

Originally Posted by williamf

the sticky sugar water will squirt out the four sucking-points like miniature fire-hoses until the bottle has completed collapsing in on itself.

It sounds like you invented the first self-cleaning feeder.

[DesertSage]

Mountains of Arizona.

[TheLorax]

I know where Portal is. You live in a birders paradise.