"I Used to Cut Down These Birds' Homes." A 69-Year-Old Logger's Last Batch of Owl Bird Feeders.
Hank Calloway spent 34 years felling old-growth timber in Mill City, Oregon. Now, in his last season carving owl bird feeders, the nerve damage that ended his logging career is catching up with his hands again. This is the final batch he'll ever make.
Mill City, Oregon. Hank is a big, unhurried man with a gray beard and a voice sanded down by forty winters. These days, he'd rather talk about chickadees than the old logging days.
"I spent thirty-four years cutting down old growth," he says. "It wasn't until I slowed down that I noticed what wasn't in my own yard anymore."
He means standing dead trees — "snags" — that cavity-nesting birds like chickadees and screech owls need for shelter. Exactly the trees logging clears out first.
"I'm not going to pretend I felt guilty for thirty years — that paycheck fed my kids. But when the mill closed in '09, I started noticing the quiet. I figured I owed the birds a house or two."
Most owl feeders scare birds away instead of feeding them
Hank doesn't hold back about mass-produced feeders.
"None of it's laziness," Hank says. "Nobody's watched what birds actually do. I have."
Why do birds trust some owls and avoid others?
Hank started carving to keep his hands busy after the mill closed. His first owl — sharp brow, glass eyes — sat untouched for six weeks. So he softened the brow, warmed the eyes, rounded the face. Within a season, chickadees were moving in within days.
The result is what he now calls the Sentinel Owl Bird Feeder — built to stand watch over a garden, not haunt it.
What makes it different
- Reclaimed cedar and birch, bark left intact — camouflage and grip for birds.
- Softened facial carving, refined over seven years so small birds don't avoid it.
- Deep feeding cavity with drainage grooves — no pooling, no mold.
- Living planter well for real moss or fern, not fake greenery.
- Leather hanging straps that won't crack in the cold.
- Natural, food-safe oil finish — no paint, no lacquer.
Hank keeps a shoebox of photos customers send him — chickadees mid-flight, kids pointing at nests. One feeder from 2019 is still hanging outside Bend: chickadees every spring, now watched by a second generation of grandkids.
The workshop is closing
Hank is closing his workshop this spring. "It's the hands," he says, flexing his fingers. "Thirty-four years of chainsaw vibration — hand-arm vibration syndrome. Turns out fine detail work isn't much kinder to damaged nerves than a chainsaw was."
No one's taking over. His granddaughter Wren built the online shop. This is the last batch he'll ever carve.
What customers say
"Neither of my old feeders ever had a visitor. This one had chickadees within four days."
"My husband is skeptical of 'handmade' claims. He looked at the joinery and went quiet."
"After two summers of moldy seed and cracked plastic, this one just works."
"My dad's an old logger too — hearing him and Hank talk shop for twenty minutes told me everything."
Most of Hank's feeders end up as gifts — for a father downsizing into a smaller yard, a retired outdoorsman, anyone who misses hearing birds in the morning.
"The best part is the photos people send me — a chickadee poking out of a feeder I carved years back. It means it's still working."
The original Sentinel Owl Bird Feeder is sold exclusively through Cedar & Tin, run by Hank's granddaughter Wren. Look-alikes exist elsewhere — none carry his years of hands-on testing.
Hank closes his workshop this spring, once the stock is gone. With nesting season approaching, what's left won't last long.
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