Photos Of Bob’s New Lone Star Goliad

[Steve Kroenke]

Photos Of Bob’s New Lone Star Goliad

Santa Claus went to the PMCA and picked up Bob a new Lone Star Goliad for Christmas. We installed the Goliad back in early February and purple martins have already moved in. The Goliad is my favorite Lone Star martin house.

This Goliad has 16 compartments and replaces Bob’s last wooden T-14. He has replaced all of his T-14s with Goliads and modified (double nesting chambers) Trio Castles. The martins have readily accepted the changes and the Goliads and Castles are usually fully occupied each season. The aluminum houses are easier to maintain and much lighter in weight than the heavy wooden T-14s.

All of his Goliads have been modified with porch dividers. We make the dividers from aluminum trim coil and rivet them to the door fronts. The dividers have helped to minimize nest domination behavior by possessive martins.

Here are two photos of the new Goliad; no martins were in residence when I took these. Also notice the bluebird house attached to the pole. Bob had this house on the T-14’s pole and the bluebirds raise two broods each season. There are no conflicts between the martins and bluebirds and the bluebirds are allies to the martins. The male bluebird is a great sentinel and has warned the martins and me of approaching Accipiter hawks and merlins on a number of occasions.

This photo shows the Goliad and the bluebird house and a net trap attached to the pole.



This photo shows a close-up of the Goliad and you can see the porch dividers between the rooms. All the compartments have well built pre nests of pine needles.



Steve

[RC Moser]

very nice. I like those houses also, but old tight pockets me won't put out the bucks for one. also like the blue bird house at the bottom. I have nesting bluebirds in my back yard close to the martins and I also never seen problem.

[Scott D.- La]

That is a very nice looking house that Steva Claus, eh....... I mean Santa Claus brought Bob. I am sure he is proud to have it. Looks like a pretty decent pole that came with it also.

[Jeff Robinson]

Steve,

For some reason, I can only see the second picture (close-up)???

Nice close-up though - I too enjoy Goliad. I'm looking out the window at mine right now.

[Steve Kroenke]

The Goliad can be expanded and the Scotts who live about six miles northwest of us have a Goliad with five floors. Looks good!

I also used a Lone Star Alamo and a San Jacinto but replaced those with gourd racks. I like gourds a lot! We placed those Lone Star houses at one of our satellite colonies and these houses are well occupied each season.

You can order Lone Stars with either round holes or crescents. We use round holes in our personal colonies and crescents at the satellites. I modified the Alamo with new crescent doors and the San Jacinto with crescent plates I got from the PMCA. Martins moved right in!

The pole is a sectional 2 inch steel pole and strong.

Jeff, sometimes Photobucket will temporarily not display a photo transferred to another site. What works for me is to right click over the area of the "missing photo" and click on "show picture" when the menu appears. That might work for you.

Steve

[DakotaLady]

The Lonestar looks like such a beautiful martin house. However, since it is made out of aluminum is it a house that the martins in the northern climates would utilize? I have an old aluminum Trio and the martins don't even look at it. I'm thinking perhaps the aluminum is too cold for our area.

I have a park that contacted me through our bird club and asked me to repair their martin houses. I do see that there is the buy one get one grant program but am a little leery of bringing this up to them due to the house being aluminum. Any thoughts?

I love your posts Steve. It must be amazing having a super colony. I can't imagine the noise you experience.

[Jeff Robinson]

Got the picture Steve - thanks!

I put the add-a-rack on my Goliad this year, but not so sure I'll be keeping the gourds on the cables between the arms. As it is, I'll be installing no rockers on the BO-11s hanging below the arms. Maybe somebody has recommendations on methods they use to give a little more stability to gourds hanging from cables I'm watching the gourds on the cables beteeen the arms swinging nearly 90 degrees down right now.

Pretty cool that the martins and BBs work so well together. I still have to keep mine separate, but thinking this might be a good idea once I've filled up my colony. Appears as if the winch is mounted a bit lower than on mine, and I noticed that there's nothing fancy or flared out about the snake netting. Have you found that it catches all the snake attempts just as well this way, or would you suggest something different?

Thanks,
Jeff

[Steve Kroenke]

Hey Dakota Lady,

I have lived all my life down here in Dixie so I am not familiar with all that real cold weather y’all get up north! From what I have read on the Forum, many northern landlords tend to use wooden martin housing rather than metal as wood may be better insulated. However, I have known of landlords up north who successfully use aluminum housing.

You could use wooden nest trays in an aluminum house and these may help with insulation and make the housing more attractive to martins.

Also thick natural gourds may be a good possibility for northern areas. These gourds have a “wood” like interior and when you add a well built pre-nest then natural gourds may work well.

I am glad you like my postings. I know all our northern friends are eagerly waiting for their martins to return home. I hope you have a great martin season!

Steve

Hey Jeff,

I have used natural gourds on cables when I had several Lone Star gourd racks. The vertical gourds with a longer neck and shape will swing much more than horizontal gourds. The horizontal gourds hang lower down on the cable and spread out; this tends to minimize the swing. I had good success with my natural gourds hanging on cables and the martins did fine. But I did notice the gourds on cables tended to swing more than gourds suspended from crossbars.

However, I am now primarily “going wireless” with my gourds. Nearly all my gourds are suspended with the hanging rods or gourd mounting arms inserted through the upper necks for verticals and upper backs for my Troyer Horizontals. The wireless approach appears to reduce the swing, particularly for the Troyer Horizontals as the gourds are not hanging as far down from the rod or gourd mounting arm.

I prefer my gourds to swing some and they have been swinging since the mid 60s. The martins have done fine in them and I have seen my gourds face hurricane force winds.

There is a law of physics called centripetal force which may impact swinging gourds. Centripetal force tends to “keep things in the center” when something is rotating. So if a gourd is swinging, the martin eggs/young will under most conditions remain together rather than be hurled out the entrance hole or be bashed inside against the gourd sides.

Of course, during extremely strong storms, it is possible for gourds to jerk and twist violently and this could harm the nest contents. But under those conditions, the entire gourd rack may topple.

Bob cut about a foot and half off the bottom of the pole to reduce the height of his Goliad and minimize swaying in the wind. He has done that with his other two Goliads, too. So this shortening of the bottom section of the pole results in the winch being attached lower down.

Once you have an establish martin colony, then bluebird “problems” are usually eliminated. The martins NOW have site fidelity and tenacity and will readily defend their cavities against any bluebirds and the bluebirds will soon realize this and peace will tend to prevail.

The net traps can be fashioned as a “ball” of netting than fluffs out around the pole or as a cone/umbrella. Both methods work just fine. We use the ball method because it is easy to do and we have so many martin systems to protect.

Snakes crawl through the open squares of the netting and eventually become entrapped; the netting is like vegetation to a snake. The snake can only crawl through so far before his girth prevents him from going farther. Then the net is tight around his body and he can’t back out because the netting catches his scales. The ¾ inch netting will catch most snakes, particularly ones three feet and longer. However, small thin snakes may be able to weave through the ¾ inch netting. I have in the past used a combination of ¾ and ½ inch netting to catch large and small snakes. The ½ inch netting may catch the smaller snakes, but this netting is most difficult to find. It is very expensive off the Internet. For most cases, the ¾ inch netting will catch the big rat snakes that often raid martin nests. We have caught some big rat snakes in our net traps and you may have seen the photos I have posted on the Forum. If you have a thick but fluffed out ball or cone of 3/4 inch netting, then this may still catch any small snake.

Steve

[geezer]

Oh Geez...don't give me anymore new ideas LOL...

What a great idea! Bluebird house on Martin Pole. If you don't have Bluebirds get some..they are great.

Geezer

[Jeff Robinson]

Thanks for the responses Steve. I've read yours and others posts before supporting gourd swing, so I'll consider it while getting everything just perfect for their arrival. I haven't found the 1/2 netting yet, but I have a few more places to try yet.

Geezer - 12 Bluebirds visiting my bell feeder today in this cold blast. Getting closer to mating - the males are getting downright agressive with each other. Nesting starts in a few weeks here.

[threelilkids]

I have caught snakes in netting too. It works great and is easy to put up.

[Fredmyyster]

Steve, nice Lonestars style ! Gonna save to get one for next season ...