Purple Martins Anyone???

[Miki]

OK so ya'll dont think the Martins make the owen nests? They make them with mud.. And the are purple birds..

[Skinny]

OK so ya'll dont think the Martins make the owen nests? They make them with mud.. And the are purple birds..

Take some time and research Barn Swallows, and Purple Martins. Look at pics of each, male and female. Purple Martins are Swallows, so they are very similar looking to Barn Swallows in some regards, but after looking closely, and knowing the differences in them, it is easy to tell them apart. I will post some pics of both to this thread in a bit.


Skinny

[shark79]

OK so ya'll dont think the Martins make the owen nests? They make them with mud.. And the are purple birds..

I've never seen them nest anywhere but in man made cavities. Apparently in the west they will use woodpecker cavities. Below was copied from the PMCA website.

Martins are secondary
cavity nesters; this
means they nest in a
cavity, but do not excavate
the cavity themselves.
Instead, they use
old woodpecker cavities,
or natural cavities in
dead trees, cliff faces,
etc. In the eastern half
of North America,
Purple Martins have undergone
what's known
as a tradition shift.
Gradually, they have
switched from using
natural cavities to artificial
housing humans
supply for them. Native
Americans started this
tradition shift hundreds
or even thousands of years ago, by putting up dried, hollowed-out
gourds for the martins. Today, in the eastern half of North America,
martins are completely dependent on supplied housing for breeding.
They now nest only in gourds and multi-compartment wood
and metal housing.

[Miki]

Ok guess I will have to post pictures.

[Skinny]

A few pics to help identify your birds...

Barn Swallows







Adult Male Purple Martin



Adult Female Purple Martin



I enjoy seeing and watching both of these different types of Swallows around the ranch...they both eat tons of insects and perform some insane arial acrobatics, but only the Barn Swallow poops all over your porch!!!

Skinny

[txsteele]

This is very cool but I have a few questions......

What's the reason for going through all the effort?
Are they bug killers or something?
What is their migrating path? South to North?
Will sparrows and starlings over take their nest and run them out or is it first come first serve?

Just trying to decide if I want to set some houses up

[txsteele]

I enjoy seeing and watching both of these different types of Swallows around the ranch...they both eat tons of insects and perform some insane arial acrobatics, but only the Barn Swallow poops all over your porch!!!

Skinny

answered one of my questions

[Ferg]

House and Gourds up for 2 years, still no Martins, tried the decoys, no luck. Had a pair land on the house last year, Blue birds ran them off.

[Skinny]

Shane, this little video kinda sums it for me.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHN2mfiPqL0"]YouTube - Bird houses for purple martins - David Attenborough - BBC wildlife[/ame]

[Skinny]

Here is a link to the PMCA website with some really good info for anyone looking to start a Purple Martin colony.

http://purplemartin.org/main/mgt.html

Just know that if you put up a PM house and the birds decide to nest there, you are very lucky. Many people have tried for years to get a colony started, and for one reason or another, the birds just do not nest in their housing.

Here is a link to another page from the PMCA website regarding PM idetification.

http://purplemartin.org/MartinID/martinid.html

[txsteele]

Well that spelled it out nicely Not gonna be able to do though....not enough space between house and trees

[shark79]

Shane, this little video kinda sums it for me.

YouTube - Bird houses for purple martins - David Attenborough - BBC wildlife

Thanks for sharing. Never seen that before. I've wondered about their roosting habits in Brazil. Never thought of them roosting in a chemical plant.

[Skinny]

Heck yeah, glad to share. Pretty neat knowing about PMs when they are not over here nesting.


Skinny

[DBLHKUP]

Scouts showed up last Sunday at my parents martin houses. We had them down Saturday to clean them, Sunday 2 scouts were checking them out. Pain in the butt to clean out the houses. I think the starlings that use all the grass, several of the apartments were full of coastal. The martins nest much cleaner.

[bowmansdad]

My wife has been after me to put up another house and after viewing the video, I
have the perfect spot that we can see from our deck. Time to go to work!