I feed 2 types of suet or lard - the plain raw beef suet in a suet cage, and a home-made mixture of rendered fat (suet or lard) with peanut butter, corn meal and flour, nuts, etc. Rendered suet stays solid at higher temperatures - I think it's in the 90s F - than unrendered suet. I do feed the raw suet year round and it doesn't melt because we don't get temps in the 90s that often, and also the suet cage is sited on the north side of a large tree trunk so it has little sun exposure. The woodpeckers love the raw suet but many other birds will nibble on it too. Many birds also love the home-made mixture, and the Bluebirds come every winter to eat nuggets. This past winter I had up to 12 bluebirds! But I feed much less of all the bird food in the summer because there are usually plenty of insects for them to eat.

We purchased the same suet cage this year that Aurore just posted. Squirrel can't get at my suet, though it's comical watching him try. He's already gnawing away at the plastic coating, but oh well. Every year prior he'd come back several times a day to finish it off. I just leave him a plastic spoon every day with peanut butter on it now instead. I have birds that climb in, and a cardinal that just puts his head in. Haven't seen a large variety of birds this year, likely due to our warmer than usual Wisconsin weather.

I have an excellent book which someone gave me called "The Audubon Backyard Birdwatcher Birdfeeders and bird Gardens" by Robert Burton & Stephen W. Kress, published by the Audubon Society on Thunder Bay Press. (ISBN 1-57145-186-2) Not only does this book have excellent pictures of birds, it has dozens of plans on how to make bird feeders, nesting boxes, bird baths and how to plant a landscape garden to attract birds. There is one whole chapter devoted to bird feeds and what birds they will attract. In addition to the common seeds and suet mixes they have a long list of table scraps that are great for attracting birds. They suggest making a wire cage and put your meat scraps in it, especially the fats that your trim off cooked hams or beef in addition to ham bones, beef marrow bones and even teh leftover turkey bones. A few other things that i found interesting was cooked spaghetti, cooked rice, uncooked pastry dough, baked potatoes with the skin on and stale cheese. Out of curiosity I baked a potato in the microwave, then sliced it in half and put it on my shelf feeder. It was a big hit with all the birds. Another thing that the birds here seem to like is orange peels. I saw a Blue jay pick up and orange peel that was 1/4 of the orange and fly off with it. If anyone is looking for a great how to book on building bird feeders or bird houses or making their own bird feeds I would highly recommend this one, especially if you are making bird feed because I am a bit skeptical of the health concerns for the birds when i read the recommendations of some books, but I don't think the Audubon Society would steer us wrong.

i was born on a farm way out in the county 72 years ago We did all of our own butchering and canning and gardening ect. In the fall when we butchered a cow or pig or venison or even a sheep we trimmed all the excess fat from the meat. we put it all in a large metal pot over a fire in the yard and melted it down and it was called rendering. we ladled off all the liquid and poured it into the 5 gallon lined tin cans that syrup or coffee or other bulk foods came in. we would put fresh butcherd chickens or steaks or other fresh meat in the liquid and in no time it would harden around the meats. With no electricity or refrigeration the busckets would keep for months down in the root celler. We used the lard or suet for frying food or seasoning veggies or in pie crusts or pastrys. The hard pieces or stuff that did not melt good we fed to the ducks or chickens or geese or even the pigs and the dogs loved cornbread made with lard. The fats from all the different animals was called suet or lard and varied which was used for what or as needed. the suet was not always melted but was ground up to use also. the flakiest pie crusts and pasterys were from pork lard. the beef suet used a lot in meat pies. and the sheep and venison suet used to season stews and soup and all were mixed with elk or venison that was ground for hamburger because it was not so dry then. Bacon grease was always saved to season foods cooked on the stove especilly snap beans or green beans or dry beans.