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Aluminum sheet baffle

Illustration by Sally Onopa

I have solved the squirrel problem at feeders -- at least at ground-mounted feeders! My actual problem was not so much with squirrels as with raccoons, which raided the feeder nightly.

I went to my local newspaper, which uses the photo-offset printing method, and bought two sheets of the aluminum used in the printing process. They cost 50 cents each. My husband bent them so we had a rectangle. The top of the rectangle was stapled to the bottom of the feeder so that the support pipe is inside the rectangle. We have a claw mark or two on the aluminum, but the raccoons have been foiled! This works well on squirrels, too.

Now if I could just stop the raccoons from tipping over my birdbath, I'd be all set.