About:
I wanted to give my cats something to watch when they sit infront of the basement window while I work so I decided to hang a bird bell to atract some
birds. After a few days the bird feeder, pole, and all were gone! The following weekend I built a beefier version and stuck it in the same spot. Again, a few days later, GONE! I didn't know what was going on. I figured we've got some giant prehistoric birds or maybe a deer is uprooting it and dragging it off.
Not giving up, I built a THIRD bird feeder, but this time I couldn't care less if the cats were entertained, I was determined to catch the culprit!
So I built an even stronger one with a steel hanging arm this time, I also made it digital baby! I attached a pressure sensitive lever switch and tied that into an x-10 window transmitter meant for home security. The lever switch was tight enough against the bird bell that gentle vibration from birds or wind wouldn't set it off. To trigger an event requires a good hard tug. On the receiving end I mapped this transmitter module to a
fire alarm so if the bird feeder is ever disturbed, even in the dead of night, I would be sure to know about it.
Result:
This contraption performed flawlessly! Only 3 days after putting it up, at about 11:30pm, it aided me in catching the bird feeder bandit red handed.
A raccoon! I should have guessed. I was able to get pretty good pictures of him. I just let him finish because every time I shooshed him away, he just
came back a few min later. So I guess if I don't want to feed the raccoons I need to use an un-climbable metal pole. Case Closed!
