This is my first year to be a diligent landlord. I have been recording the progress of nest building and watching the egg count grow in my three houses. Each of my houses have the double compartments. On two occasions in two different compartments, I have found eggs removed from the nest and placed in the "foyer!" one egg in one nest and two eggs in another. Each egg has a little hole poked in it.
My husband has taken care of all the starlings in the area but we do still remove a sparrow nest daily.
Do you think it is the sparrows poking holes in these eggs? My husband is just itching to take a more aggressive approach to the sparrows.
Secondly, I have been removing the dead eggs as I find them. Is that the right thing to do?
There is about a 90% chance that its the sparrow pecking the holes, it could be a SY male but I doubt that. If you don't have SREH, it could be starlings, but starlings just carry them away and drop them. If you don't see them do it, sometimes its hard to tell.
I see no reason to leave the pecked eggs at the house, I think its best to remove them
Sometimes insert traps work, where you put the trap into the cavity where the sparrows are building. But sparrows are smart, sometimes they see the trap and will not enter.
When martins have eggs or tiny young you NEVER remove sparrow nests. You must kill both sparrows before you remove their nest. You are experiencng male house sparrow revenge. And your martins may not renest. It could even cause the martins to leave the site for good. Good luck....
If i was in your situation i would purchase an ST1 trap from nature house or get a repeating trap and fill it with white bread. I would not mess with the martin house until these rats are trapped. just my opinion. Anyone else care to chime in here?
If you have wrens close by, they are also notorious for piercing the eggs of other birds - I don't know how to discourage them, and I used to love having wrens nest on my property until I discovered this
We also have had martin eggs pierced the last couple seasons, and I had wrens nesting at the time, so we figured they were the culprit after learning of this behavior
I agree with Stan, be careful - shake the eggs hard to addle them, then focus on getting rid of the house sparrow pair - then toss the nest & eggs. I am following the same strategy at new public site where we cannot shoot the HOSP, and so far I have not been able to trap them. The one pair of martins have eggs, and I don't want to lose them to angry house sparrows. Here are some links with info:
Removing HOSP nests is fine up until the martins have eggs, but eliminating the HOSP is always the best option. good luck!
PS, forgot to say, in Texas, House Wrens are not a problem as they are not a nesting bird for the most part, just overwinter here. The wrens that do nest here and will use nest boxes - Carolinas and Bewicks, are not egg peckers, only House Wrens have that habit.
My feeling is it was from a Male sparrow, I will put glue traps at each sparrow entrance to catch the pests, but you must monitor it so no Martins use the perch, I never had a problem with this beause a male sparrrow will protect his perch or entrance site, so I wouldn't be to concerned, I staple the trap down on a wooden perch or tape it down on an aluminum perch, within minutes you should catch your sparrow, then just remove the bird and trap all together repeat if needed. glue traps for (Mice) work great and are cheap to purchase, I usually buy the large ones and cut them down in 2x2 squares. Good Luck!
kborder....same problem here. House Wrens pecked at least 4 eggs last year. I thought I'd have 2 BB pairs nesting in both my boxes this year, but a House Wren pair took one of them, so I'm likely in for another martin nest pest! I really don't have a place to move that box out of sight of the Martin colony like Louise had suggested before.
This one is pretty easy to figure out... since you know you have a sparrow nest and have been removing it. You have a sparrow problem . I don't know if it is revenge or not, that is what it is often called. I am not sure sparrows feel the need to get revenge, perhaps they do...who knows? Smile. They do peck holes in other birds eggs for whatever reason....perhaps an attempt to eliminate competition. But, like the others have said you need to get rid of your sparrows and your egg problem will soon be gone in all probability
What kind of houses do you have? I have a Nature House Trio MSS-12 & a 24 Castle I have made into double compartments but have a spare-o-door trap & a single compartment in each...the sparrows always go into the trap! I've caught 16 male hosps & 2 females this spring! You can also get a universal trap that fits in other houses. There is a new one especially made for SREH entrances if you don't have round holes.
One other thing you can do for hosps if they have laid eggs is smash their eggs & they will leave then. But I probably would get more aggressive at trapping & shooting them instead of taking any more chances of "male hosp revenge"!!!
but we do still remove a sparrow nest daily.