If you could give 1 piece of advice to New Landlords, what would it be?

[sharonkayford]

My neighbors have had PM gourds and a PM dbl decker house for about 8 years. Their birds come back every year and we all really love watching them. PM's are kinda a big deal here on Lake Murray so hubby and I decided last year that we would put up some houses in our yard for the 2021 season. After doing a little research, I decided to purchase 12 chirpy nest units. Tom (Chirpy Nest owner) gave me a few options for poles, one was the 12 Unit Gemini pole from Purple Martin Products. I called them and they suggested I go ahead with the double tier (24 units) to save money in the long run. I bought the 24 unit pole and ordered 12 more Chirpy Nests. We also added the worm wrench (say that 3 times fast!!)

The pole assembly was tedious but doable. Someone should REALLY do a YouTube video on that! I was going to but since working on a project with the hubs can already so much fun (haha) I skipped the filming idea. We put the pole in concrete on Thursday, installed the pole and pulley on Saturday (4 hours-ish) and then put the racks together on Sunday (3 hours-ish) We have 1 house hung, just for looks. Waiting until we see Scouts at our neighbors houses, then we will add some starter pine straw nests, number the houses, and get them up in the air. I've already started saving eggshells to supplement, if needed.

I've admired PM's since I was a child. My father erected a large PM house in Lake Charles, LA (where we lived) It isn't up any longer, but it might still hold the record for largest PM house or maybe not anymore, idk? I am making notes from all the information I've read on this forum and info I've gotten from the Chirpy Nest site. I'm going to give it all I've got to document, count eggs, check houses, clean nests, count babies (probably not called babies, I'll get the right word) supplement food, etc etc etc.... I never knew what all went into this adventure!

My neighbors put their gourds up in February, take them down in September and thats it! They always seem to have bunches and bunches return every year, so maybe doing all the counting and cleaning isn't necessary, but I didn't put that pulley system together for nothing, so we are going to go the whole 9 yards!! If anyone cares to follow along with us, I have a live cam stream you can join us at lakemurrayosprey.com We mostly keep the cams on our Osprey pair, but I will be giving regular updates on our PM adventure!!

If you care to share your knowledge with me, I would really appreciate knowing

" What 1 thing (ok 2 or 3 if you like) would you suggest a new Landlord make certain they do?"

Thanks in advance
SK

Update: The PM largest house record has def been broken since the one my dad helped erect. There are some HUGE houses out there!

[G Saner]

The best piece of advice is to place the house/gourds in an open area. The more open the better. Number two would be to place it not too far from human activity. Number three would be to control sparrows and starlings.

Gary

[sharonkayford]

Thanks Gary,

Your 1 & 2, I think we are 99% ok. #3 is going to be a "wait and see" this year. I've read lot of posts about those two threats and people have some (understandable) STRONG opinions about how to deal with them. Fingers crossed the Chirpy Nests' entrance keeps at least the Starlings out...will have to see about the sparrows. Appreciate your reply SK

[PMDavid]

Hi Sharon, David in Louisiana. Welcome and good luck! Gary and yourself are spot on with 1&2......if I may,#3 for your enjoyment ..don’t make a chore,job ,or work out of it! It’s to enjoy and relax. Now on #4 ....starlings and sparrows. I’m one of those STRONG opinionated folks,so I’ll spare the gore. Advice,if you don’t totally control the sparrows and starlings you will have only a few to no martins,and shortly the few will turn into none. Sparrows,kill the male the female generally will leave. However I try to get em all. Starlings ,they all have to go. I wish you the best of luck it seems to me you got it going on with plenty of housing and a supply of prospective Martins to come from overflows and sy birds from the neighbors. I’d say you are in a great position to get a nice colony going quickly! You and the neighbor will benefit from each other’s colony. Hope you do well.
David.

[brent]

My piece of advice is to check nests regularly. Really look and see what's going on. Also walk around daily and observe. My friends and family say I spent too much time on the birds. My reply is "I put the house up and invited them." Have a great season!

[Dave Duit]

1 is sparrow and starling elimination. 2 is weekly nest checks for possible mites or dead babies.3 is supplement feeding during rainy stretches.

[C.C.Martins]

Hi and welcome, wish you all the best of luck this season. I guess you will run into differences in priorities based upon varying experiences but the same themes will be there...there are a ton of Martin-smart folks here to help.
Here are a few thoughts Id offer:
1. Location, location, location. Keep your housing in a free flyway (as best you can) but close to human activity.
2. Do not allow sparrows to co-mingle with Martins, do what you can be brutal about it if necessary, but they are predators in my book. I too have SREH entrances so starlings are not a #1 worry but starlings are not welcome around either.
3. Be active with your colony, walk out in the yard, let them see you and get to know you, do weekly nest checks especially when eggs are hatching, after and just before fledging. It is rewarding and the Martins will come to see it as normal activity.
4. Control mites/blowflies. They can wreak havoc.
Lastly; enjoy the Martins while they are here, take care of them, but they are not a fire and forget bird. There will be ups (arrival!!!, first fledges, enjoying the hustle and bustle of a Martin colony, dawn song, etc), and downs (dead martins, lost chicks, lost eggs, hawks, owls) and the list goes on. Steel yourself for the bad times and some of the unpleasant tasks we must undertake, but know the Martins will appreciate in the end.
5. ALWAYS ask questions of us!
Just my 2 cents,
Hope your colony thrives!
Tom

[deancamp]

I think G Saner hit it right on. To attract them you should be playing the Dawnsong all day or as much as possible and I think decoys help as well. The dawnsong will attract them in to have a look, at that point you want your housing to look like an active colony. Decoy, pine straw or anything you have read to make it look lived in. Martins like other Martins, so make it look like they are already established there. Good Luck

[sharonkayford]

Lots of great information and I appreciate all of your replies!!
SK

[Spiderman]

It sounds like you have a lot of advantages most new sites don’t have. In addition to your neighbors colony, being on a lake is a huge plus. I live on a lake and had a lot of Martins my 1st year. Bugs and water are the magic bullet.

Go ahead and put all of your chirpy boxes up now. Add the pine straw and number them. If you have sparrows/starlings deal with them before the Martins arrive. I’ve already caught 7 starlings that the Martins won’t have be harassed by when they arrive.

Can the Martins see your rack from the neighbors established Colony? If so that will help to get you started, if they aren’t too far away. Once they arrive try not to raise and lower the rack a lot until they get established.

If your neighbors have used the scout map before you can find them in last years map and see their entries for past years, it will tell you what day you should expect your 1st arrivals.

Once the Martins are established at your site try to spend some time out there in the afternoons when they come in. If a Coopers Hawk is going to catch one, this will be when he will come.

Raptors usually will appear at almost the same time everyday, If there is human presence he will skip the location for today.

[sharonkayford]

@spiderman thank you for your reply.

I've seen 4 maybe 5 hawks since living here (24+yrs) and 2 Great horned owls on nearby islands, but not in our yard. I have a pair of Osprey that have been returning to a nest in our yard, since 2013. Ricky & Lucy arrive end of Feb and leave about end of Aug. The PM's & the O's co-habitat well! When the O's aren't here we have a pair of adult Eagles that stop by to fish very often from Oct until mid Jan. So we have a lot of raptor presence! Probably helps in keeping the Hawks and Owls away, I'd never really thought about that before. I know we have starlings & sparrows. I see them on the live cam. So far the neighbors haven't seen any of them take over their nests. Maybe luck? idk.

Thank you for telling me to go ahead and get the nests up in place. I have been checking the scout arrival report and they are close! We will get them up tomorrow! I'll try to leave the cam on the PM's nests more in the next 3 weeks. Lucy usually arrives around 28Feb and Ricky a day or two later, so there isn't any Osprey action to speak of, presently. Time for the purple martins to get some cam time!! I am so excited!

The live cam is located at lakemurrayosprey.com if you would like to check out the PM nest set up.

I just moved the cam to the nests and I "think" I just saw a PM! It was fast, I'll rewind and look again. Do the males come back first or do both male and female return/scout? What I saw looked like a female.

Thanks again.
SK

[Bird Brain]

Before deciding on housing placement, I would make sure I had a concealed location to shoot from. Traps aren't always effective methods of HOSP control, and they can be time consuming. Well aimed shots from a cloaked location is the only 100% effective method of HOSP control for me anyway. You can't let the HOSP see you, or your weapon of choice. If it can see you coming, you will almost never get a shot. Examples of such blinds are sheds, barns, well houses, privacy fences, windows, tall shrubs, fat trees, corners, and well placed vehicles or farm equipment. The further your martin housing is from sniper cover, the harder it will be to target those house sparrows. I'm fortunate to have a 6 foot privacy fence 30 feet away from my martin pole. I can plink a HOSP easily using a low velocity air rifle with iron sights. If my concealment were any further away, I would probably need to scope my air rifle, which is fine also. A good way to measure HOSP population is blue bird sightings. If you see bluebirds regularly, then your HOSP population is minimal. If you haven't seen any bluebirds lately, then you probably have more HOSP than you realize. One benefit of controlling HOSP is exponential increase in bluebird populations. I didn't see a bluebird for 40 years until I started a HOSP control regiment. Now I have a VERY large local bluebird population and I love it. Tearing out HOSP nests without dispatching is like pounding sand and will only frustrate you. HOSP eradication is not optional. It's mandatory. It's the difference between a "martin colony" and a "martin slum."

[John Barrow]

Welcome Sharonkayford,

I would recommend that you avail yourself of a ton of information by going, 1) to PMCA's main website following the link provided in this forum and familiarize yourself with articles linked under the "Purple Martins" and "Research" tabs found at the top of its home page. 2) Read through and become familiar with the "stickies" posted by forum administrators at the top of this forum's index. These provide links to numerous published articles that provide important information that will assist you in day to day endeavors of a successful landlord, in addition to providing links to articles and resources to deal with a prospective emergency problem (supplemental feeding, locating rehabbers, control of interspecific competitors, etc.).

Enjoy your journey with these personable birds that have the uncanny ability to capture our heart.

[sharonkayford]

Fantastic information. Thank you
SK

[Dave Reynolds]

.... With out repeating what John Barrow said. (Which is very good information). I would suggest making your Martin site as wide open as possible.. I tryed for years with no success,, Every year I removed a few more trees and kept moving my Martin house to the most centered area of my property.. Finally after a few years of removing more trees, my site became more open with more room for them to fly in and out of the houses and gourds... If you don’t have Martins offer them all kinds of housing and gourds. Along with a verity of entrances. Good Luck in 2021..

Dave

[D. Doll MN]

One suggestion I can think of is when you do start doing nest checks, best to do mid day or so. Most martins lay there egg early morning, and a lot of feeding after that. So just try to do most nest check when you feel you will not be disturbing them the least. And the more you interact with them the more they act as if your not there. One year I had a few ASY female martins that wouldn't even fly off the nest when I lowerd to count the eggs.

[sharonkayford]

Thanks for that information. I'm more nervous about the nest checks than anything. I will have 24 nests. I'm really looking forward to following and keeping up with their progress and fledging!

SK

[Spiderman]

Thanks for that information. I'm more nervous about the nest checks than anything. I will have 24 nests. I'm really looking forward to following and keeping up with their progress and fledging!

SK

I usually do nest checks about 2:00pm once the babies have hatched out. There is some pressure because you are stopping the food supply the entire time the rack is down. In the mornings it is much cooler and the hatching babies need to be kept warm until they get some down on them.

[sharonkayford]

Good point!

[Whippy]

Sharon,

All great advice on the nest checks and one thing I would add to that is this:

Keep records. It is good to know how many eggs you have, how many hatch and how many babies are in each gourd or house cavity. As you get more and more pairs this is critical because you will always have a baby or two Peter Pan off the gourd or house porch and end up on the ground. They usually get pushed off by a sibling. If you keep good records you can return the baby to its proper nest.

I do a nest check once a week usually on a Friday around 2 and 3pm.

Also. I saw you mentioned having seen some hawks in the area. Do some research here on the use of decoys as hawk distractions. I have posted on it several times and have included pictures as well. Others have spent time on the subject prior to me which is where I got a lot of ideas and helpful tips.

Decoys are great for attracting Martins in the early parts of the season but, once you get occupants, move the decoys away from the housing and put them on a post or rod or something about 10 to 20 feet from the housing. Hawks will always go for the slowest and easiest target. My decoys have saved countless Martins. Observe the paths that your Martins take when they leave the housing each time they leave and put a decoy in that path. When a hawk busts in on housing, the martins will take that known path and the hawk will grab the decoy rather than continue chasing the departing Martin.

One last thing on that. Hawks also use pretty much the same path as they come in each time. I learned where the hawks come from in my yard so I put decoys in that path. I never saw a hawk grab a Martin. I also can't watch 24/7 so I can't say it's 100% successful but I am spared the nightmare of watching a martin getting carried off.

I'm open to receive questions so don't hesitate to send any along if clarification is needed.

Good luck to you.

Coolwhips