Backyard Birds – Part 9

One of my favorite parts of making this cabinet was making the birdseed for the bird feeder.

In order to do this, I chopped up a bunch of veneer scraps of different colors, including some dyed woods. I used a chisel for this, and the hardest part was making sure that the tiny fragments didn’t fly off when I chopped them.

(It turns out there was an easier way to do this, but unfortunately I didn’t realize it until I was already done. My friend Tony stopped by the shop, and I showed him what I was doing and explained how much trouble I’d had keeping the fragments from flying away. Tony picked up a pair of scissors near the workbench, grabbed a piece of veneer, and started cutting it with the scissors. Sure enough, the fragments didn’t fly away. Lesson: Always consult with Tony.)

I made a shallow tray out of MDF (medium density fiberboard), which I lined with wax paper. I poured a layer of wood glue onto the wax paper and sprinkled the wood chips over it.

I put another layer of wax paper on top of that and a small piece of fiberboard, the same size as the bed of the tray, over that. I used clamps to press all the layers and left everything clamped together overnight.

When I took everything out of the clamps, I had a little rectangle of “birdseed” veneer.

The first pass was pretty successful, but I was worried about how well all the fragments would hold together, plus there were some spots where the little wood chips were too sparse. So I filled in bits that didn’t have enough coverage and re-pressed the veneer, this time using epoxy instead of wood glue.

The epoxy worked really well. I was able to sand the veneer, and it held together. I could also cut it on the scroll saw just like regular veneer.