Barn-wood Bird House

So my parents love old barns.  I remember a few years back that whenever my Dad would pass an old barn that looked like it was being torn down or was about to collapse he would ask the owners if he could collect the barn-wood.  Since then he's been making a bunch of barn-wood furniture, barn-wood frames, and bird houses.  My Mom has been using the barn-wood for photo transfers, and book covers, printmaking, and probably another half-a-dozen  other things.

Perhaps I should have mentioned previously that my Mom is an art teacher and my Dad is an engineer.  My little sister is going to school for a BFA.  So the amount of crafting that happens within my household each week is mind-boggling.  So when I need help with a project I have to work it out with them ahead of time.  This past Sunday when I came by the house to pick up some things I asked my Dad if he'd teach me how to make a bird house on Monday.

So it's Monday and I don't have class because it's a holiday, and today I made a bird house.  My Dad helped with some of the cutting for safety reasons, but I've done 95% of the work on this project!  (From his own lips!)

Barn-Wood Bird House

First thing you're going to need is some barn-wood.  Thank goodness there is just a box of it sitting around the garage.

 

So here is a list of the materials:

barn-wood

branches

brad nails

nails

screws

copper plated rod

wood glue

Tools Used:

table saw

air powered nail gun

drill press

hammer

power drill

various sized bits

circle saw

Steps:

1. Gather the tools and the materials you will use.  

2.  Draw your design.  I decided to make a shack with a slanted roof and a pipe coming out of it.  I wanted it to kinda look like a moonshine shack.

3.  Chose your dimensions!  I decided I was going to have the back wall be 10 inches and the front wall be 8 inches.  I chose a base that was big enough for the pieces of barn-wood I was going to use that also had a nice rustic edge.  The only real measurements after this that would be needed was to measure between the walls for the front and the back wall.  The roof would be much like the base, just a piece of barn-wood that would be squared off.  Since barn-wood already comes in planks that are generally the same size, there is very little cutting.  Its really more about which pieces you choose.  Holding up the right and left wall of the bird house you can measure what the width of the front and back wall need to be.  My measurement was 5 1/4 inches.

4.  Cut the wood 'square'.  When my Dad said this I had no idea what he was talking about, but I quickly learned that it meant to make the edges that we wanted even to be even, like the back of the base that would line up with the back wall; as well as the roof that would fit over top, and the bottom of each wall so that it would line up with the base.  I used a table saw to square up each piece.

5.  Cut more wood, no but really cut all your dimensions.  Using the table saw after all the pieces are squared up, I cut the lengths I wanted for back and front wall, and then measured with a ruler on the left and right wall what angle I would need to cut.  To be able to place the roof, I also had to cut just the ends of the back and front wall so that the roof wouldn't bulk up and instead lay 'evenly'.  (Its barn-wood, it isn't going to lay flush!)

6. Now that we have all the walls and the roof and the base, we have to place the hole for the birds in the front wall.  So, then I moved on to the drill press for the next part. I decided to put my hole just above the center so I would have room for the perch.  I used a circle saw to mark where I was going to be putting my hole.  It's best to mark where you want it and then drill through the wood all the way around the mark.  The wood is really thick and it can be hard to cut through and damage your circle saw.  So just go into the wood a little, use that as a tracer and then drill with a smaller bit straight through the wood all the way around the circle.  Then you also what to use a larger bit to drill a whole straight through the middle.  This will make it easier for you to completely cut out the hole with the circle saw.

7.  The last bit that I did with the drill press was make a hole with a bit that was the same size as the branch that I picked out for my perch.  Don't go completely through the wood for this, only go in about half.  You'll end up using wood glue to secure the perch.

8.  Now that all my walls are done it's time to nail everything together!  Using an air powered nail gun (specifically the kind that uses brad nails), I nailed the four walls together.  The brad nails are just used to hold the form.  You want to go back and also place straight nails with a hammer next to the brad nails.  You put one nail at the top and one nail at the bottom, rinse and repeat for all four sides.

9.  The walls are secure now, and you can add the roof.  Using the powered nail gun again, secure the roof to the walls along the edge, once it is secured by the brad nails you want to go back and place a straight nail next to the brad nail.  You may need to use a powered drill to make a starting hole for your nail.  It makes it a lot easier.  

10.  The bird house is ready for the base.  For the base, you want it to be really secure, so I used a powered drill to screw the base to the walls.  The main structure of the bird house is complete.

11.  You can now put wood glue into the notch you made for your perch and then stick it in.  It'll take a day or so for it to dry, so you'll need to put it somewhere while the glue sets.

 

12.  Embellish your bird house with a bit of flavor!  You can paint it if you want, but I wouldn't suggest painting a barn-wood bird house.  You can add a bench on the base, or dried moss, or little logs.  For my bird house I decided to add some logs outside and I decided to add a little copper smoke stack coming out the top to go with my moonshiner theme.

13.  The last step for your bird house would be to decide where you want to put it and how to hang it.  You could put it on a post, or in a tree, or on your deck.  It's really up to you from here on out.