Why a Scrap-Timber Bird Table Is Worth Building

A decent bird table does two jobs at once. It lifts seed, suet and kitchen scraps clear of the damp ground, and it puts the birds at a height where you can actually watch them from the kitchen window. Shop-bought tables are often flimsy affairs made from thin softwood that warps after a season. Build your own from offcuts and you get something that will see out a decade of British weather — and you will have spent an afternoon in the workshop rather than fifty quid in a garden centre.

This design is deliberately plain. A square top, a chunky post and a pair of cross feet. There are no fancy joints, no router work and no need for a bench full of machinery. If you can saw straight and drive a screw without splitting the wood, you can build this.

Choosing the Right Timber

Root through your offcut pile before you buy anything. The best candidates are:

• 18mm exterior-grade plywood for the table top — stable, weather-resistant and easy to cut
• Offcuts of larch, cedar, oak or iroko for the post and feet
• Pressure-treated softwood, provided the feeding surface is left untreated or lined
• An old scaffold board, planed up, for a rustic-looking top

Leave chipboard and MDF well alone: they swell, crumble and go mouldy within a winter. Avoid creosote-treated timber, and be wary of old pallet wood unless you know what it has been in contact with. Rough-sawn surfaces are actually a small advantage, as birds get a better grip on them than on a polished finish.

Sizes, Cutting List and Kit

The dimensions below give a table roughly 500mm square on a post that stands about 1.7m above ground — comfortable for most gardeners to reach and high enough to feel safe for the birds.

• Table top: one piece 500 x 500 x 18mm exterior ply, or four boards 500 x 100 x 20mm
• Upstand lips: two at 500 x 50 x 20mm, two at 460 x 50 x 20mm
• Post: 75 x 75 x 1800mm
• Cross feet: two at 600 x 75 x 45mm
• Braces: four at 200 x 50 x 20mm
• Optional roof: two at 560 x 140 x 18mm

You will need a fine-tooth saw, a cordless drill with 3mm, 6mm and countersink bits, a square, a pencil, exterior PVA glue and stainless steel screws — 40mm for the lips, 60mm for the top and 80mm for the feet. Stainless is worth the extra few pence; ordinary steel screws will bleed rust stains down the post within two years.

The Joins and How to Assemble It

Start with the feet. Lay one 600mm length flat, offer the second across it at right angles and mark a half-lap notch 75mm wide and 22mm deep on each. Saw down the shoulders, make a series of cuts across the waste and chisel it out. Glue and screw the lap together, then check the assembly sits flat on the bench. If you would rather skip the chisel work, simply screw the two feet to opposite faces of the post with 80mm screws, counterbored, and add a diagonal brace to each corner.

With the post standing on its feet, fix the table top. Cut four braces and screw them to the top of the post to form a cross, then screw the table top down onto the braces. This spreads the load and stops the top cupping. Drill pilot holes through the top first so you do not split the ply.

Add the upstand lips around three sides of the top, leaving the front open for drainage, and drill a scatter of 6mm holes through the table surface so rain cannot pool. If you are using boards rather than ply, leave 4mm gaps between them for the same reason. The optional roof is nothing more than two boards set at a shallow pitch over a central ridge batten; it keeps seed dry and stops the table becoming a bird bath.

Finishing, Siting and Aftercare

Sand the arrises so there are no splinters, then treat the post and feet with a bird-safe water-based preservative. Leave the feeding surface bare, or wipe it with raw linseed oil — never varnish or paint it, as flakes will end up in the birds' food.

Site the table 1.5 to 1.8m above ground, roughly 2 metres from a hedge or shrub so birds have a safe retreat, but at least 3 metres from a window to cut down on collisions. Keep it well away from fences and branches that a cat could use as a launch pad, and set it on firm ground so the post does not rock. In an exposed garden, sink the post 300mm into the soil or drop it into a metal ground socket.

Good hygiene matters more than good looks. Scrape the top weekly, wash it monthly with hot soapy water and a diluted bird-safe disinfectant, then rinse thoroughly and let it dry before refilling. Move the table to a fresh spot each spring to stop droppings building up in one patch of lawn. Check the screws each autumn and re-tighten any that have worked loose, and give the post a fresh coat of preservative every couple of years. Look after it and this table will keep your garden busy long after the offcuts it came from would have gone on the fire.