Absconded

I always do my Project Feederwatch on weekends.  Weekends are the only days I am home during daylight hours to watch for birds. It's dark when I leave and dark when I get home.  Darkness is the reason why I don't know which day my bird feeder system failed again.  If you remember, I strung a cord from a tree across my yard to a pole on my deck.  I suspended a platform feeder from the cord.  I had a peanut feeder but the delinquent squirrels took it apart. They actually peeled the wire off the side of the feeder.  I jury-rigged that with some floral wire and put it back on.  On either side of the feeder I had squirrel deterrents such as lengths of PVC pipe, aluminum pie plates, and empty soda bottles.  When the squirrels tried to traverse the cord, the bottles and pipe would spin around.  Last weekend the system was up and working. Some of the more acrobatically talented squirrels got on the feeder but not all.  When I went to investigate why the cord was down, I saw the squirrels had bitten through the cord.  Dastardly beasts.  I restrung the feeder and added more deterrents.  This time I added a larger soda bottle and even a half-gallon milk bottle.  I would just like to see a squirrel hang onto the sides of a milk jug when it spins.  I tied a knot in the cord and just in front of the knot I added a square 18 inch piece of Plexiglas.  When the rope broke, some of the equipment scattered.  I knelt in the snow searching for my bird feeding equipment.  My peanut feeder is missing.  The squirrels absconded with it.  They probably thought, "Why fill our cheeks with nuts and make many trips when we have this handy dandy container to carry peanuts to our hidey-hole?"  I cannot believe the nerve of these squirrels.  Next year I'm changing plans.  I'll put a platform feeder on a pole instead.  I might use a wide piece of PVC pipe for the pole or a thinner pole with an upside-down metal bucket or piece of stove pipe on it.