Season end - Silver Lake WA.

[ken buker]

Hello All,

Here is a final season report from my purple martin colony located at Silver Lake, WA. My last young martin fledged this morning (8/23) and as of late evening there are no martins seen or heard.

This lone survivor is a story in itself and a true tribute to the parental instinct of our beloved martins. The rest of the birds have been gone from the colony for nearly two weeks (much earlier than usual) as the season this year was more condensed than normal with little separation between nesting AY and SY birds. This late young pair started their season with a three egg clutch around July 4th hatching on July 21st (the second of two banding dates this season).

Over the course of the following two weeks the 128 young birds banded along with about 35 others that we didn’t band for various reasons, fledged and by August 11th it was very quiet. I chose that day to check on their status finding a single chick, not three like I was expecting. Have no clue what might have happened to the others but have learned over the years, some things just often happen and we can only speculate why or what.

On the 17th of August, I noticed that the female seemed to be the only one in the area and her mate nowhere around. By mid week she was seen only occasionally and she seemed to be trying to coax junior out through the entrance, but unsuccessfully. On the 20th, 21st , and 22nd, I didn’t see her at all and I was worried maybe she had abandoned her chick. It was 30 days old by this time. On the afternoon of the August 22nd I lowered the rack and inspected the chick to make sure it was normal. It was. My fear of course was that if the parents were gone there was no hope of its’ survival. While cleaning my car Sunday morning (8/23) to my astonishment I heard a young martin fledgling chirping in the sky above. Along with it a single female. I immediately ran out to lower my rack and check on my young survivor, and low and behold, he was gone. They hung around for the afternoon, but wasted no time and did not return to the nest Sunday night. Only the power above knows what’s in store for this late lone juvenile and its mom, but true to nature, she did her duty and now they are on their way to join the rest of the flock.

A recap of my 2015 season is good. Not the best, but definitely not the worst. There was a total of 87 active nest at my site. A net gain of two from last season. Last season included a half dozen re-nesting pair so the actual count was less than the observed count. Egg clutch size was down this year as was percentage of eggs hatched. There were 6 failed nest for whatever reason with a total of 27 deceased hatchlings. The red tail generated a fair amount of disruption during fledging again but I believe his success was limited. With the warm dry weather there were few jumpers or premature fledgers, prime candidates for his weary eye. That’s not to say he didn’t get some in my absence.

Two days of banding (7/9 & 7/21) yielded 278 young birds banded. Fewer than subsequent years, but still not bad. A total of between 343 and 350 chicks hatched or 3.9 per nest.

Now that it’s all quiet, I will begin dismantling racks and cleaning gourds for winter storage after Labor Day Weekend.

Sad thing I guess about early arrivals, is it makes for early departures as well.

Ken Buker
Silver Lake, WA.

[taxidermy lady]

Great story Ken! Thanks for your year end tally!