Are bluebirds a threat ?

[Siberman]

I have one bluebird house ~ 200' from the Martin houses . Last year I had a pair start investigating but the male was constantly perching on the Martin houses. I tried to discourage him by firing a bb gun into the air ( NOT at the bird ) every time I saw him there but unfortunately it resulted in the pair leaving my area .

I have a friend who had problems with bluebirds building in his round-entrance house ( mine are all crescent ) but he didn't have any available bluebird houses . I have a pair this year . Should I just leave them alone ?

[Peggy Riley]

I'd leave them alone. I have several pair and they are just using the housing for perching. If they try to nest it would not be hard to discourage them.

Peggy

[Bulldog1]

My experience is that they can be a pest but not a threat. Once I got em to nest in a bluebird box over 50 feet from my set up I really enjoyed them. Plus they do not like sparrows.

I read a thread on here last year about how bluebirds can actually help with sparrows.[img][img]http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g80/h ... -18-12.jpg[/img][/img]

[Mike1624]

I agree with Peggy. One of my bluebird houses (the one that they always occupy) is 20 feet from one of the martin houses. They will occasionally perch on top of the martin housing, early in the season, but when the martins are really active, they don't go near them. They use the B&B to get pine straw and egg shells, sometimes when the martins are doing the same thing.

They don't interact with the martins the way that the Eastern Kingbirds do, but everyone seems to tolerate each other fine.

[Mike in NC]

We had bluebirds for years while trying to attract martins. Finally last year we got our first martins to move in. The bluebird house is about 75' from the marin house and the bluebirds would perch on the martin house frequently. But when the time came and the martins wanted to move in, they didn't let the bluebirds discourage them. I would say just enjoy the bluebirds and trust that the martins will not be discouraged by bluebirds - provided that your housing is desireable.

[DornCounty]

martins have been dealing with blues for 1000's of years. As long as they don't nest in your house I would say all is good.

[Louise Chambers]

Bluebirds should be compatible - they don't compete for food, since they hunt for insects on the ground for most part. Usually they will be busy feeding babies much sooner than the martins.

You can supply an extra hunting perch or two for the bluebirds - a bamboo pole with a small crossbar, about 7 ft tall or so, is easy to place in the yard for them. Having one nestbox within 50 feet of the martin house is a good idea, since the pair that nests there will not tolerate another close by, and will run off any bluebirds that try to claim space in the martin house.

The winter issue of the Update, in the mail now, has an article on bluebird management, which we hope folks will find enjoyable and helpful.

[RC Moser]

Bluebirds are actually good hawk watchers. I had bluebirds nest in my backyard for 12 years and have never had any problems between them an Purple martins. They have spotted hawks many times giving my PMs a few seconds heads up.. I feel they saved quite few over the years... They perch on Pms houses and perches daily never been problem here.

[flyin-lowe]

According to your signature you only had one pair last year. If you don't have any returning ASY martins this year you will want to keep the BB's away or they can discourage SY martins from settling in. If you have ASY returning from last year then they will have site fidelity and will not be discouraged or run off by the little bit of harassment the BB's might cause.

Dan Drew has a protocol that covers this topic for tree swallows and most of the same information applies for BB's as well. The link is not working, I don't know if Dan is still active on here or not.

[Louise Chambers]

I found one link to Dan Drew's info that seems to work okay:
http://www.drugfreeworkplace.com/~Dan/T ... GENCY.html

[Bulldog1]

That was the article I was thinking about.

[flyin-lowe]

Thanks
The old link I had and the one I found on the forum were not working.

[Dave W]

Last year I was surprised to have a pair of bluebirds move into a lower gourd in an 8 gourd rack with 2 of the top gourds occupied by martins. They all got along famously and fledged young, although 1 of the martin gourds had nest failure due to the male disappearing and SY harassment. The bluebirds came in late in the season and were a nice surprise!

[Connie]

I have bluebirds perching on my PM racks too. I have 2 bluebird houses 50 and 100 feet from my martin housing. They never seem to bother the martins and like it was said earlier they eat ground insects so no competition there. I have never read that bluebirds help with sparrows though. I didn't see the thread bulldog1 said he saw on this forum but if you house bluebirds please keep an eye on the sparrows on their behalf also. If you can stomach it, go to the link below and you will see that the sparrows wreck havoc on the BB's also. They will peck and kill the babies and the adults then build a nest right on top of the devastation. It is awful.

http://www.sialis.org/hosp.htm

[Bulldog1]

Connie,

I got confused about the bluebirds and the sparrows. It happens as you close on your 60th birthday.

[Siberman]

Thank you all for the replies.

Louise: I have no shortage of perches around the yard / pasture . I like to encourage Phoebes to nest around the house and have a framework supporting the drip irrigation in my veggie garden .

flyin-lowe : Thanks for the article . The closest BB house is around 200' from the Martins . The adult male Martin didn't blink an eye at the male bluebird but I'll see how any young'uns react this year. I've become rather vigilant about cleaning starling and sparrow nests out of my houses so this shouldn't be a problem .

Connie : You have no problems with BB houses 50' apart ? Good to know . I've never seen them attack sparrows either but I'll take all the help I can get. I've caught 14 sparrows this last week in my trap .

[~Ray~Gingerich]

I have had blue birds nest within 100 ft with no problems at all, like Peggy said they will use martin housing as a perch when hunting insects. Now tree swallows are different story, they can create major problems, especially if your martin colony is small or trying to attract martins.

[Connie]

Bulldog....it happens earlier to some people....lol....I get lost in my own house these days....sad isn't it...

[Connie]

Siberman,
yes, I know right? I am suprised they nest so close...I know they are very territorial.

[flyin-lowe]

You never know for sure exactly what mother nature is going to do. The year before last I had 2 pair of TS nesting in the same gourd rack (less then 3 feet from each other) and another pair nesting in "their" gourd on the Shepard's hook 35 feet away. That is not supposed to happen but when you have a huge population and limited housing strange things can happen.