Vacation Time - Decision Time

My wife and I are actually going away for a short vacation.  Of course, there are a lot of arrangements to be made to prepare for the trip.  Being The Bird Watcher I guess it is normal that one of my main concerns is how "my" birds will survive while I’m gone.

Find the passports, print the tickets, stop the paper and mail, check, check and check.  I usually hire a pet sitter to fill the bird feeders while we are gone.  Well, not this time!  I don’t mean that in a defiant, "I’m not going to do it" tone, but we are only going away for eight days and this is the "fall slowdown" time of year.  Natural food is plentiful for the wild birds and they don't visit the feeders much anyway.  I would be more concerned with the birds’ ability to find food if this were another time of the year.

Full feeder with no birds...must be Fall!

So, for a while, my birds will have to survive without me.  I will make sure the feeders are full before I leave and not worry about them while we are gone.  That’s not true - of course I will worry about them, but I know that they will actually have plenty to eat in the wild.  Even if the feeders are empty when I get back, the birds will be fine.  The fact is that our feeders are not the only food source "our" birds depend on.  They are very, very good at finding food.

Maybe I'll put out one more feeder before I leave...