The media could not be loaded. I've been using this feeder for almost five years now. . .and it has functioned well. I have it up year around and no issues have ever arisen. In fact, when I clean it up, it still look almost new. Most importantly, though, the birds love it--at least the chickadees and nuthatches. . .and a little red squirrel here and there. Every day, 365 days a year, I have to fill this feeder. The wire mesh/screen design makes it possible for birds to land anywhere on the feeder so to allow a good number of birds to be on the feeder at once. Even if a red squirrel is hanging on the feeder, there still is room for the birds to get at the seed. The feeder is very well made. The wire mesh/screen is strong. . .and the top cover and bottom are even stronger, made of a very durable, painted metal. I've never had a problem with it falling apart or issues with sharp wires sticking out similar to how another customer complained. Even after the feeder was raided by four chubby raccoons every night for a month, the feeder remained intact and in good shape. I must be upfront, though, I had two of these, but one went bad, became rather dysfunctional. But. . .it wasn't because of a poor design; it was because a black bear came into the yard and tried playing with it as if it were an accordion. After than, the feeder looked closer to a mashed metal pretzel than a feeder, so I had to throw it away and get a new one. The feeder holds peanuts or black oil sunflower seeds. For black oil sunflower seeds, this feeder shines. For peanuts, not so well. . .especially in warmer temperatures. Being that the holes are smaller than most shelled peanuts, the birds can only peck at and take out little chunks at a time, similar to what they do with suet. In my area, birds aren't that crazy about peanuts, and will mostly leave them alone, unless they have easy and direct access where they don't have to work for their food (like pecking through a wire mesh). And being that most peanuts won't fit through the mesh, if your birds do peck at them, it will take awhile for them to empty out the feeder; this, in turn, will be an issue if you get rain or have a lot of moisture in your area. There is nothing to protect the peanuts/seed from getting wet--nothing. Wet peanuts can become moldy quite quickly when wet. Most black oil sunflower seeds, on the other hand, fit through the wire mesh easily enough. So even if it rains, the seed will be emptied fast enough before going bad. . .unless you don't have many birds. If you get a lot of rain in your area or live where the humidity is very high, I wouldn't suggest using a feeder such as this. The exception to this is if you have cold winters where it stays below freezing. And speaking of raccoons. . . I used to have my feeders on seven foot metal poles with a baffle halfway up the pole. This kept the squirrels out. . .and the raccoons, but I had trouble with deer standing up on their hind legs and lapping up the seed with their tongues. . .or knocking it around with their heads and/or faces so the seed would spill. The only thing I could do was start hanging my feeders higher up, and that meant in the trees; but, of course, this opened the door for the raccoons. . . I don't know if many of you have ever had issues with them, but they can thoroughly damage your feeders and gobble up all your bird food. They truly are gluttonous nuisance. There is a way to raccoon-proof your feeders, though, and the design of this feeder is excellent for that. When raccoons--four of them, to be exact--started raiding our feeders, they would climb up the tree and out on the branch I had my feeders hanging from. They would then tip the feeders over so the seed fell out. . .or unhooked them so the feeder fell to the ground. Most of the time when the feeder was dropped to the ground, it broke, especially if it was comprised of any plastic. I lost several feeders and a good deal of bird seed this way. At first, I thought hanging the feeders from a long hook would be enough to keep the feeders out of reach, but. . .being that the hook rested on the branch, the raccoons simply lifted the hook off the branch so the feeder and hook fell to the ground, which resulted in more busted feeders. I then taped the hook on the tree branch so the hook could not be removed and also taped the end that the feeder hung on so the hook was closed and thus wouldn't allow the feeder to be swung off and dropped to the ground either. (For ease of feeder removal and filling, I attached a spring snap hook to the feeder.) This worked for a couple days, but. . .those raccoons eventually learned if they grabbed the long hook and walked back or forth along the branch, they could swing the feeder up until it was within reach. . .and then would dump its contents. You could say I was getting a little pissed. I tried several different ways of hanging with hooks, but they all failed--eventually. One day, though, I had an interesting idea : if I could somehow weight the bottom of the feeder so that the raccoons couldn't lift it or swing it up, that would prevent them from getting at the seed. I got a thin but durable rope and an old 10 lb. anchor (anything heavy that you can tie a rope or wire to would work), and then threaded that thin rope through the very bottom of the wire mesh/screen on the feeder and tied the rope to the anchor below. It looked rather odd, but. . .I had a good feeling about it. And you know what? It worked, and worked well. The long hook (three feet) prevented the raccoons from reaching the feeder. . .and the rope tied to the anchor below prevented the raccoons from lifting or swinging it up. This configuration didn't stop the raccoon from trying (they are a very obsessive bunch), but after several nights coming up empty and then almost getting stuck in-between the branch and ground, the raccoons finally gave up. Happy days. Took me practically a whole month fighting with those fuzzy brats before I was finally able to figure something out. I had to eventually change out the rope, though, for our little red squirrels chewed through it. But the second time around, I used a 1/8 inch plastic covered wire, which has been on my feeder ever since. The wire mess design and durability of this feeder made my raccoon-proofing possible. I attached a video for everyone to see. To me, this is a very good feeder, one of my favorites. It's endured a lot of abuse and in more ways than one. Yes, it could be a little bigger so a person wouldn't have to fill it as often, but that isn't always a bad thing, for it prevents the seed from spoiling, especially if it gets wet. As I stated before, wire mesh feeders such as this are probably better suited for cold temperatures where you don't have to worry so much about rain or moisture getting your seed or peanuts wet and thus rotting them out. If you want a good winter feeder that is very durable and that will attract a lot of clinging type birds, you may want to give this one a try. A five star product.
