PVC Pipe Bird House
It might be winter now, but it won't be long before bird life is looking for a place to set up a new home.
22/05/2018
These pretty little PVC pipe bird houses can be designed for your local bird life and make wonderful homes in your garden. Make a variety of shapes and sizes and paint them in your choice of colours to add a vibrant splash to a plain garden.
The bird houses shown here can be assembled as vertical or horizontal bird houses, for mounting onto a structure or a tree branch.
YOU WILL NEED:
PVC pipe that you will find at your local Builders Warehouse
Small branches or dowels
Plywood offcuts (or buy quarter sheet of plywood)
Piece of galvanized tin, sheet metal - or recycle an aluminium coffee can
Galvanised roofing nails
Rust-Oleum 2X or Universal spray paint
Waterproof glue or construction adhesive
TOOLS:
Drill / Driver plus assorted bits
Jigsaw or hacksaw
Router
Tin snips
Hammer
Tape Measure and Pencil
HERE'S HOW:
1. Cut a 30-degree angle at one end of the pipe.
2. On a piece of plywood, outline the shape of the pipe to make a front and back piece. You need [2] circular pieces with a diameter that equals the inside diameter of the pipe.
3. One of the circular pieces has a hole in the centre, cut out with a jigsaw. You need [1] solid circle and [1] ring for the vertical birdhouse.
4. You will also need to make an entrance hole and a hole for the dowel or branch perch.
GOOD TO KNOW: If you are making this bird house for a specific bird species, do some research on the best hole size for that particular bird.
5. The vertical bird house also needs a roof. Draw the outline for the pipe onto a piece of plywood approximately 180cm square - depending on the size of pipe you are using for this project.
6. Use a router and cutting bit to rout a slot along the drawn line. This allows the roof section to fit onto the top of the pipe.
7. The roof of the bird house is clad with galvanised sheet - or you can recycle a large coffee can for this - and is cut to fit over the roof and be folder over and under the sides. Use tin snips to cut a large piece of sheet metal for the roof and to snip where you will fold over.
8. Secure the sheet metal to the roof with galvanised nails.
9. For the horizontal bird house you will need to drill an entrance and perch hole. Use a spade, MAD or Forstner bit to drill out.
10. Before you join all the sections together to create the bird house, spray in your choice of colour. Clean and dry the pipes before spraying.
GOOD TO KNOW: To make it faster to spray, thread the pipes onto a length of string and hang up on a line.
11. All the wood sections are given 3 coats of exterior-grade acrylic paint - or use a water-based or oil-based enamel paint.
12. To assemble, place the front entrance inside the angled end of the pipe, allow some of the pipe to serve as an overhang for protection from the elements.
13. Secure the plywood entrance to the PVC pipe with a screw and washer on two sides.
14. Push the plywood ring firmly in place at the back of the pipe and secure in the same way as the front section. The back acts as an access panel for cleaning out when birds move on and is simply screwed into the ring already inside the pipe.
