Terry Miles displays some of the yard art he has created from scraps and other discarded metal in July at his home near Scranton. Miles said he has continued his scrap metal hobby for 10 years.

SCRANTON ? When Terry Miles looks at a rusty disk or shovel for sale at an auction, he doesn’t see useless farm tools or equipment. He sees tail feathers for a turkey, the curved body of a frog or petals for a flower.

Miles deconstructs metal equipment and objects and then uses the scrap iron to build yard art.

“You got to have a little imagination and the right piece of metal,” the 56-year-old Union Pacific track foreman said.

Miles said he began creating his artwork about 10 years ago. His first piece was a Jayhawk made from a shovel, pick, bicycle fork and shoe forms from a cobbler.

From there, he went wherever his imagination took him.

Typically, he gets an idea, sketches it on paper and then can’t wait to start making it.

The yard of Miles’ home southeast of Scranton is a showcase for his work. Scrap-metal flamingos standing 4 feet high languish at a nearby pond. Large spiders formed from disk blades or milk cans crawl up the side of a tree. Cornstalks made of rebar and scrap metal with real ears of dried corn serve as squirrel feeders.

His smaller creations are lined on shelves outside of the garage where he grinds and welds the metal pieces together. Horseshoes become cowboys. Circular faucet handles become flowers for a wall hanging that has a floor heater register or a basketball goal as a frame. An iron skillet serves as the body for a mouse while nails and ball bearings help form its whiskers and nose. Railroad spikes become the body of a sprinting roadrunner.

“You can’t make two things the same way,” he said, looking over his work.

While Miles does all the grinding and welding, his wife, Debbie, often helps paint his creations.

Miles doesn’t participate in arts and crafts shows, and he doesn’t sell his yard art on the Internet. His customers find out about him simply by word of mouth.

“I do a lot of trading with people,” he said. “I just like making people happy.”

Miles said he has a list of scrap metal projects he’d like to do in the future. At the top of that list are an elephant, a Kansas State University wildcat and a totem pole.