by Lori Turner

If you’ve been wanting a book on how to build bird boxes, then Bird Man Mel Toellner’s new book, Making Bird-friendly Birdhouses (2024), is the book for you! I’ve been wanting to build some nest boxes for different species and this book has plans for 15 species of birds and even a few bat houses. There’s a section on the bird species that use each box, a colored picture of their eggs and a description on why you should attract them to your property. There’s another section explaining the tools and material you’ll need, which I found to be helpful on gathering a list of material and tools to get them built. There’s a separate section with the patterns and is referenced in each project.

This book is well laid out and easy to follow.  It helped me decide which bird boxes would be best for my property. I promise that this book will not disappoint if you are looking to build nest boxes! Since I got this book, I’ve been telling everyone about it and even took it to work and have been showing everyone! I’ll be ordering several to give out as gifts. It is available at Songbird Station.