DIYer Shares Their Creative Birdhouse From Recycled Materials

Attracting wild birds can fill your yard with song and color. Many of your feathered visitors will eat weed seeds and pests like aphids and beetles, too. There are a number of birdscaping tips that can turn your garden into a bird haven, but nothing beats a birdhouse to provide protection for keeping them around all year long.

Most birdhouses you can DIY seem to be made of wood, but all is not lost if you don't have the tools necessary to start woodworking at home. It's also possible to make them out of a variety of recycled materials, and over on YouTube, a channel called Home Decoration Master uses a plastic bottle, some cardboard, burlap fabric, and string. You'll need a utility knife, scissors, a pair of compasses, and a hot glue gun as well.

The plastic bottle in the video has a narrower 'waist,' making it easy to trim it down and fit the two halves together. If yours is straight, cut the bottle down to size (dimensions aren't included, but around 6 or 7 inches in total looks about right), then cut a narrow band from one end and use it to wrap around the joint and hot glue everything together. Be generous with the glue. Everything will be hidden when the birdhouse is finished. You need three circles of cardboard for the bottom, top, and roof. If you don't have compasses, find a glass or mug of roughly the right size to draw around.

Stick the bottom, top, and roof pieces to a scrap of burlap and cut around them. Then glue burlap around the main body, and glue on the bottom and top circles. Trim the edges and add more glue to prevent fraying. Cut a 'V' out of the roof and glue the cut sides back together to form a peak. Mark and cut a hole in the body for the birds to get in. Finish around the bottom, the hole, and the edge of the roof with twine. Make a small hole in the roof and add a loop of twine for hanging, then glue it in place.

That's how the DIY birdhouse is made in the video, but we can make a couple of small alterations so it is more comfortable and safer for birds. The hole size is important to make small birds feel welcome and to keep out birds you don't want to see in your yard — about 1¼ inches is good, but the ideal hole size depends on what type of bird you want to attract. The inside of the plastic bottle is very slippery, particularly for fledglings. So cut a small piece of burlap or some short pieces of twine and glue them to the inside, below the hole, for the young birds to climb up. Finally, drill four small holes in the base so condensation or rainwater can drain out.

Don't worry about nesting materials — the birds will bring their own. Different species of birds like different environments, so you might want to investigate that before hanging your birdhouse if you want to attract a particular type of bird.