Patents for Bird Feeders

If you ever had any doubts that backyard bird feeding was big business, those doubts will quickly be dispelled by scrolling through the 406 396(!) patents issued by the U.S. Patent Office for bird feeders of various design. The vast majority of these patents appear to have been issued since 1980. The earliest I found was this design for which a patent was issued to Lewis P. Kelly in 1926:

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