The Turks and earlier the Ottomans have a rich tradition for pottery and ceramics. Go travelling to Turkey and you will be either be taken to a dozen pottery factories or a dozen shops to buy a carpet. Going back from ancient Ottoman traditions of building mansions for birds, a tile factory Hitit Terra in Turkey had a new idea: turn some of the tiles for roofs into nesting boxes for birds.
Enjoy the pictures below, along with some older renditions of Turkish bird houses.
Before you buy however, read the comments from an experienced bird house builder who claims the opening of the house along with the stick is like a snack dispensary for birds. The openings need to be narrow enough for certain species of birds to enter, but not too wide that predators can get in. We also suspect that with warming climates, best be advised to put them on the roof slope away from the sun.
All handmade things, including these Tunisian tiles risk disappearing forever, along with the birds. Let’s support and do handmade so we can keep our humanity and human scale in the built world.
Image credits of 3 images above: canercangul
Author: Karin Kloosterman
Karin Kloosterman is an award-winning journalist and publisher that founded Green Prophet to unite a prosperous Middle East. She shows through her work that positive, inspiring dialogue creates action that impacts people, business and planet. She has published in thought-leading newspapers and magazines globally, owns an IoT tech chip patent, and is part of teams that build world-changing products to make agriculture and our planet more sustainable. Reach out directly to [email protected]
