This project is for the birds...#5

great work David !

-- work from your heart and your spirit will live forever

Cool looking bird house. Almost too well made for birds. mike

-- Mike. mwurm13@yahoo.com

Fantastic! I really like the shingles and the siding.

I know some people up in the foothills here in northern California who have some cool bird houses like this on poles in their back yard. The woodpeckers filled them up with acorns. Packed em so tight they can’t shake em out. I don’t think the woodpeckers can get them out either LOL.

-- Scott - Chico California http://chicowoodnut.home.comcast.net

great piece of work there david ! i humbly bow to your patients and workmanship ! great job

Wow That turned out very nice David !!!
The roof looks great and it sure looks like a lot of cutting.
How long do you figure it took you to do this house ?

I have wanted to build one with cedar shingles but after seeing this i,m guessing it would be a lot of work to shingle a 8 ft birdhouse .lol

Nice work David

-- John in Belgrave http://www.extremebirdhouse.com ....http://community.webshots.com/user/cranbrook2

Yea, too good for birds!

-- Gary, East TX -- The longest journey begins with a single step.

No, Gary this project is definitely for the birds. Seriously David this is a wonderful project. I can’t imagine the patience and perseverance it took to put this together.

This is definitely an upscale housing unit and will command a “high” rent I am sure.

Is it hinged so that you can get to the interior?

Thanks for the post.

-- With God's help all things are possible- even woodworking. Woodworking is not just a hobby, it is an (expletive deleted) expensive hobby.

One of best looking bird houses I’ve seen, classy and functional without being too ornate. Your going to have some very fortunate birds that will probablt tell their friends about their new digs. Great job!

-- Sawhorse - Sulphur Springs, TX - www.sawhorseworkshop.com

Very Very Nice. Great Craftsmanship, Great Ideas, Great All Around. I think it beats out my Solar Heated Duplex Birdhouse, that is being studied right now by the University of Nevada in Las Vegas. A Computational Fluid Dynamics computer analysis is being done and I was going to wait until the results were in before posting it but even if it fails the strict guidlines I set for the test, you might get a kick out of it. It does get mighty cold here so I thought I would help out our little feathered friends a little bit so I designed one that uses no electric and no moving parts. I’ll post it on my Blog. Once again that is a very nice job you did there. Excellent work.

-- Rich, Nevada,

Great looking bird house. Should be a productive spring in you neighborhood.

-- Bill - "Suit yourself and let the rest be pleased." http://www.cajunpen.com/

Nice! I admire your patience and perseverance.

I was wondering how you were doing with this!
Rick hasn’t started his yet – I’ll pass on the info about the cedar shingles :)

You have done a super job. Well done.

-- ~ Debbie, Canada (http://www.execulink.com/~yohan)

It looks better then mine. lol
The cedar shingles really add to it nicely.

-- John in Belgrave http://www.extremebirdhouse.com ....http://community.webshots.com/user/cranbrook2

Thanks for all the great comments everyone! Nice of you to say that John, but this is just an execution of your design…you are the giant birdhouse zen master! A few thoughts in hindsight..

I would use a cheaper materiel…..I love the western red cedar, but unless your buying a decks worth it’s not cheap. The only barn board I could find was almost as expensive as the WRC and really would have been dimensionally unstable. If I do another I will make it out of a less expensive decking grade of cedar, or maybe pine.

Forget the shingles! Even though I am happy with the result, getting there was a pain. You can only go so fast, you have to let the glue set or all the shingles start moving around. It was taking me 35-40 minutes per row not counting the cuts around the dormers. And that opens another can of worms. The shingles are fragile and have a tendency to snap along the grain when you try to cut them. I ended up turning my Porter Cable mini belt sander upside down and scribing a pencil line on the shingle and sanding to the line. That actually worked really well. If you like the shingle look, it’s not hard to do..or expensive..I think 1500 shingles cost me $30 bucks..it’s just real time consuming.

If anyone looks at Johns or my birdhouse and wants to build one I say go for it! It was allot of fun, and Johns plans are well written and easy to follow. I made a few dumb errors like not milling enough log material at the start, but other than that it went really smooth. Just make sure you can get some seamed metal roofing material!

-- David, South Windsor, CT "I love the smell of sawdust in the morning"

Once i get these 10 birdhouses done that i am starting soon i will build one with wood shingles to just to share your pain. lol
Yours turned out great. It,s too bad the red cedar is so expensive because it looks great.
I get the barn wood free so i will stick with that for now .

-- John in Belgrave http://www.extremebirdhouse.com ....http://community.webshots.com/user/cranbrook2

Great job!

-- jeanmarc manosque france