Our hummingbirds arrived at Big Mill B&B quite late this year -
but once they landed, it was with a flourish and a big show,
chattering and demanding food.   (Photo by Guy Livesay)

And since we are a designated Bird and Breakfast Bird-Friendly Business, we willingly obliged. Guy's outstanding photo, taken here at Big Mill B&B, earned him 1st place in the 2010 Beaufort County Arts Council Nature/Wildlife photography contest. 

Our zinnias seem to be a favorite 

Photo by Guy Livesay

Guests often ask me if there is any time during the year when you should stop feeding hummingbirds? If you have had a similar question, here's my answer:

It is perfectly alright to leave the feeders out until freezing weather arrives. The birds usually leave when their food sources (flower nectar and bugs) are no longer available. You may get a traveling hummingbird guest en route to warmer climates.  Big Mill seems to be a favorite spot for such hummingbird "refuelings!"

Hummingbird Nectar Recipe

4 parts hot boiling water
1 part refined white sugar
Few drops of red food coloring, optional, but not necessary

Stir this mixture until all the sugar is dissolved. (Audubon suggests that you boil the sugar to kill any bacteria. If you change the water every day, this is not necessary).

Allow solution to cool before filling feeders. This sugar water can spoil in hot weather, so change it often, at least two times a week or more. Store any excess nectar in the refrigerator.

Oops! Just gotta get to that great nectar. (Photo by Guy Livesay)

So, have you had any good hummingbird sightings this summer?  Share your best photos with us over on Big Mill Bed and Breakfast's Facebook page .

And while you're there, take a minute to write on our "Wall."  

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In honor of Earth Day, 2009, we are celebrating our first
Big Mill "BIRD and BREAKFAST." 
Find details about our earth-friendly special below.

Guy Livesay took this photo of one of our feathered Goldfinch guests
admiring our gorgeous azaleas in full bloom.

We offer food & lodging for finches, bluebirds, purple martins, barn swallows, Carolina wrens, hummingbirds, cardinals and throngs of other birds. There is no charge, but they are encouraged to pose for photos and to sing.

(Bluebird photo by Guy Livesay)

Many feathered couples stay at Big Mill Inn and they especially enjoy our homegrown sunflower seeds and suet.  In fact, our Big Mill Birds are quite discerning and refuse to eat the store-bought suet.

So while I am making breakfast for our people guests, I whip up a batch of homemade suet for our Big Mill bird guests.  They love it! I am excited to have discovered a great use for left over bacon fat — it makes great suet! 

The woodpeckers at Big Mill really like fruit so any excess fruit goes into the suet. I have great hopes of making soap with the bacon renderings some day, but that hasn’t happened yet.  Until then, it is suet.   

Big Mill SUET RECIPE for the Birds

• 3 cups corn meal
• 1/2 cup shelled seeds like sunflower or thistle
• 1 cup crunchy peanut butter (store brand is fine)
• 3/4 to 1 cup rendered fat.    (lard, bacon drippings, etc.
• Several large pine cones
• Optional: 1 cup chopped fruit and/or a cup of quick cooking oats

In a large bowl, mix the corn meal and seeds together. Using two forks cut in the peanut butter, as you would for a pie crust.

Melt the fat and pour into the corn meal and peanut butter mixture. Mix well and allow to cool. If it is too runny, add more corn meal or some oats.

Stuff the suet into a pine cone. Hang several of these stuffed cones from a limb (as in photo above.) In a few days your birds will love you. I hang mine near a feeder to speed this process.

This recipe is very flexible-and a good way to use grease and fruit. Store excess suet in the refrigerator.

(Photo of Big Mill Bed and Breakfast Goldfinch by Guy Livesay)

Big Mill "Bird and Breakfast" Earth Day Special

Here’s how it works:  Just call us anytime during the months of April and May, 2009, book a two-night stay for any time in 2009 and mention this special promotion when you make your reservation.

You’ll receive:  
A one year’s subscription to Rodale’s Organic Gardening magazine, a thistle bird feeder or sock and some honest-to-goodness Big Mill homemade suet with a recipe card, so you can keep up the good work when you get home.

We are Bird Friendly and our birds know it. Moses has retired and poses no threat.
     

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Lake Mattamuskeet and the Pocosin Lakes of eastern North Carolina come alive every winter as thousands of tundra swans and snow geese make the journey from the Alaska tundra to our Inner Banks. Both refuges are an easy day trip from Big Mill Bed and Breakfast.

(Photo of Tundra Swans by Guy Livesay of Livesay Photography)

As many as 20,000 Tundra swans and 80,000 snow geese overwinter in these refuges. These magnificent swans and gregarious snow geese feed in the fields during the day and return to the lakes, rivers and sounds for the evening.

(Photo of tundra swan by Guy Livesay of Livesay Photography)

There are over 50,000 acres in the Lake Mattamuskeet National Wildlife Preserve in Hyde County and over 110,000 acres in the Pocosin Lakes Wildlife Preserve in Hyde, Tyrell and Washington counties.

Pocosin is an Algonquin word meaning swamp on a hill. A type of shrub bog, the Pocosin habitat is unique to the southeastern US from Virginia to Florida, but most common in eastern North Carolina. I can still remember my mother talking about some wild-haired person as "looking like a Pocosin bull," usually in reference to an unkempt relative.  

(Wilson snipe photo taken by Big Mill guests Jane and Craig)

Pocosin Lakes is also home to raptors, black bears and the endangered red wolves and the Red-cockaded woodpecker; and neo-tropical songbirds can be seen here in summer and on their spring and fall migrations.

Fires burn often in these peat bogs and in June, 2008, lightening started a wildfire that burned 40,000 acres in ten days; smoke drifted as far west as Raleigh. This fire continued to burn for most of the summer of 2008, burning thousands more acres of peat bog. Birds and wildlife were displaced but they are very adaptable. Scientists think that the fire may actually be a benefit to the preserve habitat.

(Lake Mattamuskeet at sunset by Guy Livesay of Guy Livesay Photography)

Fires are not the only threat to these fragile lands. The Federal Government planned to acquire 30,000 acres for military purposes to build an Outlying Landing Field near the Pocosin Lakes Refuge where jets would battle the swans. A hue and a cry went up from residents of these small family farms, who were joined by other folks who cared. Nearly every yard in these inland coastal counties had its NO OLF sign.

After a long, tedious and bitter battle the Navy announced on January, 2008, that it was abandoning the project. I could hardly believe it, that residents, man and beast, reptile and fowl of the Pocossin won. Still to this day I cry every time I think about this victory. You can still see NO OLF signs in yards-some folks don’t want us to forget this hard-won fight. 

Thanks to my birding friends I have met here at Big Mill B&B for all the birding tips and the great photos. Some of these folks belong to the Carolina Bird Club and their January, 2009, meeting was held in Williamston. Club members made numerous field trips and recorded 126 species of birds.

Big Mill Bed & Breakfast has recently been designated a Birder Friendly Business by the North Carolina Birding Trail. 

Bird watchers are a great bunch of folks and they are trying so very hard to teach me to recognize all the birds that come to Big Mill for Bird and Breakfast. And if I name a bird incorrectly I expect my birding friends to let me know.                                                     

While you are in eastern North Carolina be sure to check out Sylvan Heights Waterfowl Park in Scotland Neck.

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