As far as I can tell at the peak Parsons had 78 total martin houses installed with approximately 400 pairs of martins. That was around the 1994 or 1995 timeframe. Prior to the start of this project(2012) there were about 40 pairs of martins in about 50 houses. With maybe 30 houses unoccupied.
For the sake of this tour if I say a new house was installed it means it has expanded compartments and SREH.. same for an Upgraded house.
Here is where it all started, the colony was founded here.. well prior to the planting of the trees you see(ugh)... Notice the sign in the background with two martins on it. The 4 houses in the foreground are all expanded compartment with SREH. The two castles in the back ground have not had a nesting bird since I started working with the colony. They will be retrofit in the next couple years.
These 3 houses are next to the above houses.. you can see the trees are an issue and these houses struggle to get birds.. the bradfords are in the dieing stage and hopefully they fall over soon. Until then they are good decoys to keep the HOSP busy. a new house here, on upgraded, and one old stock 12 compartment house.
This section is diagonal across a 4 lane street from the original section. Here are 2 retrofit MK-12's to expanded compartments and 3 new house/pole combinations. There are probably 10 nesting pairs in these houses this year. Notice how close the road and bank drive way are. The traffic does not appear to bother the martins and in 3 years of monitoring I have only seen one fatality due to collision with cars.
One upgraded MK-12 and one new house pole combination. Currently 5 or 6 pairs here.
Lonestar Alamo - purchased via BOGO PMCA grant program, one new house pole, one one existing 12 compartment winch style trio with wrap around porch. Currently hosting at least 6 pair.
1 new house pole combination... 3, 12 compartment houses that have been repaired. No martins currently likely due to tree issues. It will host again as at least 2 houses are acceptable if population levels are high enough.
One new house and pole.. I call this the donut shop house as it sits on a 3 or 4 sq ft patch of grass in front of a donut shop. No green space around.. it currently hosts 2 or 3 pair. Great PR here as people are getting in and out of cars all morning to get donuts. Typically this is the first house of the year to get martins.. must be the donut grease.
Upgraded castle to 12 expanded compartments, 2 new houses. Another great PR spot as this location is probably the 2nd or 3rd busiest intersection in town. Currently is near capacity I would say 14 or 15 pairs minimum. By now I think folks should rest easy knowing traffic is not an issue for starting a colony.
Three new houses and 2 new poles. This colony section had been unoccupied for at least 5 years prior to this one. Currently there are 1 possibly 2 pairs here with at least one other SY male. Big victory for our work as this is an ideal location with a pond and lots of walking traffic.
Replaced an old gourd rack with the MPP from Tony.. two new houses on it. Also one old 12 compartment in the background.
Well that's all the photos I have.. there are probably 20 more houses not shown, but these are the most interesting ones. Feel free to toss out any questions you may have. Hope you enjoyed it.
