Cave Art Bird Boxes.

I read that bird boxes are best made from sawn timber. This is a little rougher than the silky smooth creamy 'planed all round' which looks really nice, but is actually probably rubbish for bird boxes then?. As sawn was unavailable in the sizes I wanted, I had to buy PAR. The reason sawn is best the text said, was because the young birds inside the box are able to get a grip on the rough vertical inner face of the box and climb out of the hole and learn to fly.
That sentance stayed with me, I imagined young birds trying to get out..... But a house which your children can't get out of is a pretty major factor if you are deciding to buy it. As a solution I thought perhaps just nail a thin strip or two to create a ladder, then I thought carve grooves with a router might be a more realistic bird environment immitation.


Then it went off the track a bit, and the bird boxes we will make at St. Martins will have pre-historic style cave paintings in these bird dwellings. They wont be paintings they will be 'routings'. Drawings of birds on all four inner faces of the bird box. The young birds in there will be able to climb around in there, building up their perching muscles all day long. I imagined it would be like a rock climbing wall in there?

my prototype bird box with 'cave routings' to decorate the inside. 

Carved pictures of birds flying, perching, feeding combined with universal symbols such as the sun and stars. I will even put some trees in there so the birds are well prepared for their adult life!

  

The prototype in my garden. I put designs on the outside as well. 

I thought the friends at St. Martins could draw trees and birds and the like and I will carve them out with my router. Cave art for birds.

Terraced Insect Homes.

This blog picks things up kind of midway, and will follow things onto a conclusion next year. I have run a few workshops now with the Friends for Mental Health at St. Martins Hospital in Canterbury. This session was to construct some insect homes which will be placed somewhere in the hospital grounds.

After a nervous start the service users began using saws, cordless screw drivers and hand held tools to construct a row of terraced houses. I had brought with me  'a couple I had made earlier' and others in 'flat pack' Ikea like style that required assembly and screwing together.



we worked in teams of two, to cut sticks and bamboo to the right length

'measure twice make once'



End of terrace.  The end sections will eventually be filled with mud,
as some insects like living in the soil.



The lower section is where my friend is placing sticks collected from the Blean Woods. The upper sections are filled with hollowed out bamboo is to encourage bees.

detail: Rooms to let.

The whole terrace, more sticks required.