Slowly, over the next several week, the birds did indeed begin to come, mostly common house sparrow, finches and a blue jay or two.

I was pleased, although it wasn't the gala grand opening I'd imagined. A few birds would come, peck around a bit, then fly away and no more visitors would appear for hours on end. Something seemed askew.

Then one day, looking out of the back door, I noticed a big gray cat that I'd never seen before nimbly jump over our back gate and saunter towards the bird feeder.

"Hey, hey, hey," I called, opening the door and addressing the cat .... The old gray cat just looked up at me nonchalantly and continued to make his leisurely way towards his lunch-at my bird feeder.

I scurried through the back door with my "go away, go away" chant and watched the cat simply scamper quickly to safety under the chokecherry bush right next to the feeder. My scolding him had no effect. It seemed a vantage point with which he had already grown familiar. Hmmm, so that's it.

Trying to keep the neighbor's cat out one's yard is somewhat akin to trying to keep the wind out. Although I myself have not seen the evidence, my wife assures me that the cat does indeed do what cats do with birds. Also with the squirrels....

Although early battles have been lost, the bird-feeder was is not yet over.

I find myself looking through the classified ads of the local paper, under "Pets, dogs, cat chaser."

This, alas, is probably how the Thirty Years' War began.

- The Christan Science Monitor