A Singing Invitation to the Kids

Ever since my first experience with getting up early to hear the purple martin dawnsong, I have been hooked on it.  I committed to getting up at least one early morning to enjoy it during each season.  Today was that day.  I got up at 3 AM, grabbed the biggest mug I have and carried my coffee out to the porch, using the little flashlight on my cell phone....which has to be the handiest thing they've ever put on a cell phone, that can only be discovered quite by accident.
This morning's early rising would also help serve the purpose of driving away or at least keeping the Great Horned Owl at bay.  As I settled in, I almost laughed out loud in the cool, velvety darkness at how loud the bullfrogs were at the pond, over 75 yards away.  How DO they manage to escape all the predators when they're making so much noise? If you're wondering where the Milky Way is right now, you will need to get up at 3 A.M. to see that one too - it's directly overhead at this time of year.  I love the challenge of trying to capture pictures of it.

A few scurrying noises around my deck made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.  I can be pretty brave in daylight, but the idea of a snake, a large spider, or some other critter accidentally bumping into me in the darkness can sometimes make me feel like I'm 2 years old.
A few of the male martins were being noisy and were loudly performing their mating calls with the clicking at the end, while still in their gourds.  It's no wonder that an owl or any other predator can easily find them at night...silly birds. And what makes them think that's what their lovely lady wants to hear at 3:00 A.M. anyway??

By 3:30 A.M., I had heard only 1 bird start the dawnsong.  He zipped out of his gourd and he was up, up, and away from the colony quickly.  At 3:45 A.M., the neighbor's rooster was crowing.  I thought, "If that were my rooster, that would be his last day to crow at 3:45 A.M.".  But that must have been my martins' queue because within minutes of the rooster crowing, the rest of the Dawnsong choir joined in.  As I scanned the yard and racks carefully watching for the owl in case she tried to take advantage (we put out solar yard lights last week), a huge number of male martins exited and rose quickly in the darkness, chortling as they rose - the only indication I had that another one was in the air. 

It's amazing how loud each martin sounds as they circle high above and sing the darkness away. As the stars started to fade and my human eyes detected dawn around 5:12 A.M., the first martin returned to the racks and proceed to womp on another male that had tried to sneak into his place while he was out gathering fresh troops. Apparently, there are no time constraints for when territorial battles can be fought. 
I took this video a couple of years ago of a male martin performing the dawnsong on my racks and it is still the best video I've been able to capture of it.

Even though I've witnessed the end of the song and their returns to the racks several times now, that part never gets old either.  Close to 60-65 martins falling out of the sky, dropping into the colony, almost all at once is a fantastic sight.
For anyone that missed it, via the PMCA - the purpose of the Dawnsong:

"Gene Morton's dawnsong theory was that adult males perform it after their mate is committed and their paternity is assured - it's safe, at that point, to invite sub-adult birds to join the site, so the senior males can have extra offspring via the sub-adult females.  So dawnsong will not be performed until green leaf stage of nest building"

And...

"Dawnsong is a unique set of vocalizations performed by adult male martins during the predawn hours of spring while flying high above their colony sites, or while perched nearby. It is a loud, continuous series of chirps presented in a syncopated series of about seven to nine notes repeated over and over. Each male flies his own path in slow, wide circles about 500 feet up, singing his own unique song. It is estimated that the sounds from a morning of dawnsong transmit to about 100 cubic miles of air volume."
(Hill, James R., Purple Martin Dawnsong, For Attracting Martins!, pg. 3.)"
http://www.purplemartin.org/main/Vocalization.html

 It must be working - as of last Saturday, May 13th, I have 3 sub-adult males.  Welcome back kiddos! 

May Flowers, Martins and Mysteries

It is either 'feast' or 'famine' in Missouri when it comes to rain. This spring, we seem to be in a state of deluge.  With the breaks in the rain, my martins were able to get out and find food. The last 2 days of rain though were just too much for them and they came knockin'.  Luckily, I had a few crickets left and a few dozen eggs.
It appears my 'regulars' remember the drill.  The banded female below wasted no time being the first up to the buffet. 

 

At my house, you best not be late when the dinner bell rings though.

I haven't been able to get an accurate count with the rain keeping most inside their gourds, but I'm estimating there are approximately 50-60 pairs here right now. 

 

In fact, yesterday evening at 7:00 P.M. when the last weather system finally broke, I stepped out to see if my colony was doing okay.  I started to worry when I only counted 5 birds on the racks.  Finally, at 7:50 P.M., they suddenly started dropping out of the sky and into their gourds.  They had taken advantage of the brief amount of sunshine and gone to hunt and gather.  It's okay, I'm not offended they prefer live, squiggly stuff over my eggs and crickets.

I awoke today to a loud, raucous noise in my south yard - the sun was out and it was already above 60 degrees!  Yay!  NO crickets or eggs today! For the first time in 4 days, I was able to just cook a couple of eggs for myself.

As I waited for the weather to warm further, so I could do what I dreaded most today, I noticed my red clover was blooming.

And my homemade bird baths were filled with fresh rainwater.  Bob and I have finally found a use for all the landscape rocks.

After putting it off as long as I could, I started lowering my racks and checking each gourd, hoping upon hope that I wouldn't find what I feared most - dead, starved martins.  I breathed a sigh of relief after lowering the first 2 racks and not finding any.  Such a relief.  Then I lowered the third rack and was shocked at the condition of the wire.  My mind couldn't put 2 and 2 together to figure out how this happened.  And wouldn't you know it - I haven't started up the game cameras yet.

The top 3 broken wires in the picture were bent out and the one on the bottom was bent down and in, with its tip behind another wire.  "Ok, WHO taught my Great Horned Owl to use a set of wire cutters?", I pondered to myself and laughed uneasily.  Racoon?  No way - a racoon would have climbed up the pole and already been inside the cage, wreaking his havoc. Owl? Hmmm - could / would an owl hang on the cage and vigorously work over the joint where these wires were pulled apart?  Why not just fly up under the cage, instead - it would take a lot less energy to do that!  Would she really wear down her beak gnawing on the wire cage, when there was an easier approach?

I called Bob out to look at it and the ends of the wire where they were separated.  Click on the pictures below to see better closeups.  Lightning maybe?  But check out the picture above....the wires are bent in different directions....

So, other than the big hole in the cage that must have been created by some super-evolved Chupacabra animal here on Gobbler's Knob, all was really otherwise very well.  I found 5 eggs in a gourd on this same rack - but I doubt they're viable, since they were very cold and there were no martins around most of the day today to incubate them.  I lightly marked them with a marker, so I can keep track of their progress...or lack thereof.  

I'm not normally a 'fraidy-cat, but dang....

Ok fellow sleuth-bugs - so what was it? 

Racing Time - Purple Martin Season 2017 Begins

On Saturday morning, March 4th, 2017, I got a phone call around 9 AM.  "Sorry if I woke you", the voice said.  After a few seconds, he finally said, "It's Luther"!  Oh, YAY!  "Hey, I have a scout", he said.  My mind zipped to the calendar and I realized that somehow, March had quietly arrived and I had somehow missed it.  I was excited for Luther - "FIRST TIME EVER, you've seen your martins arrive before mine", I shouted.  He was tickled.  I was tickled.  And then I suddenly realized, I've been far too busy with work to even notice the changes in the season.  Congratulations, Luther & Fonda on the first sighting of the season!  Now, I need to get busy.
Later that day, I decided to go out and enjoy the sun and make sure I had some gourds out, since I had to leave soon on yet another business trip.  It was hard to get into the spirit of the season after having experienced my most difficult year.  But, after raking up 5 bags of white pine needles and stuffing a few gourds, muscle-memory took over, along with the warmth of the sun and a bit of joy started to shine through.
That afternoon, as I hung the last gourd on my rack for the day, I heard that familiar chirp. I looked skyward and found her.  Yes, for only the second time in the history of my colony a female showed up first!  She flew circles around and around me, and as she shared her joy of being home, through tears of joy, I managed to say, "hello Gorgeous, THERE you are!"  I felt so honored, after such a devastating last year, that they would actually return to my site.  It didn't take long - later that evening, she had already found a male ASY to keep her warm at night.  Ironically, my first dude back has a pretty yellow band on his left leg, so I'll be getting his number soon.  Looks like SHE already has his number.

First arrivals - 2017 - the male in the upper left gourd is banded.

As I stood and watched them both circle my site and chirp their happy, "hello" to me, I suddenly realized that I have been way too engrossed in my job to engage in the things that bring me joy.  With all the travel and work stress, I had forgotten that this is where I find my peace and center myself.
It has been almost 3 weeks since that first pair showed up and I now have 20 martins on-site.
I am a pro at not only creating bad habits, but also breaking them and I am getting myself outside every evening when they come home and watching them as they swirl round & round the site, each circle bringing them lower & lower to the gourd racks, until they finally zip right into their own gourds and get instantly quiet for the night.  What a delight!
The Trendsetter has been taken down this year.  Even if I installed a larger cage on it, I couldn't get past the memories of last year and it obviously had become a magnet for the GHO.  Instead of digging yet another hole in the yard though, we decided to use the existing Trendsetter ground stake that is firmly ensconced in a way-over-engineered concrete hole which will definitely hold the new super system.  But first, we had to adapt the 2" square ground stake to the new 3" pole.
We were finally able to find a talented fabricator and he created a new ground stake that would help us transition the 2" ground stake to the new 3" ground stake I needed for the new Super System.
The inner measurement of the square had to be 1 11/16" to fit tightly around the existing ground stake.

The length had to be 27".  The fabricator was very clever in how he built this new ground stake up to exactly the right measurements.  He used the welds and plates to make the second outer tube fit solidly on the inner square tube, finally creating the exact size - 2 11/16"- needed to fit inside the 3" gourd rack pole.

Bob added some grease to the existing 2" ground stake to help with water and ensure the new stake slide on more easily.

Then slid on the new ground stake and greased the outside of it also.

The new rack is in place and all the arms have been mounted.  I still have some work cut out for me - this weekend, I need to install the new cage on this new system, but the worst part is now over.  Each step brings me closer to letting go of the Trendsetter and its memories and looking forward to a new season.

When Love and Despair Collide

...or maybe a better title is, "when two passions collide".  I dunno. The 2016 purple martin season was my most challenging season I've ever experienced.  It was a year where my old self and my 'new & evolved' self encountered each other and had many, many heated conversations.  Being passionate about wildlife means you have to accept many pleasant and unpleasant things dealing with life and death.
Our 23 acres, nicknamed "Gobbler's Knob" is a true wildlife sanctuary.  A sanctuary where all native wildlife, whether predator or prey, is welcome. I am blessed to have the opportunity to work from home and be able to observe the predators that frequent my back yard and even more fortunate when one hangs around long enough for me to get its photograph.
We have coyotes.

We have foxes.

We have quail (as well as many other native birds) nesting here.

We have Red Shouldered hawks.

We have an extremely fast, aggressive Sharp-shinned hawk that visits my site early every spring to help herself to the tired, migrating martins and manages to bring out the very best selection of my Navy vocabulary.

We even have our beloved national symbol visit my backyard, only 50 feet from my office window - the American Bald Eagle.

But one predator in particular - my resident Great Horned Owl - has worn out her welcome and this past purple martin season she pushed....nay - she strained the limits of my love for her.  The problems I had with her this past year drove me into deep introspection and forced me to explore my commitment to being a good steward to all things wild, possibly even shutting down my colony.
I totally understand that each and every animal is subject the predator-prey relationship.  That is the one law to which all members of nature are bound, not because they signed on to it, but just by the very virtue of their existence, they must abide by it, including me.  My reasons for not killing this owl have always extended far beyond the fact that it is illegal to do so. No, I have not killed her because of my own principles - I strongly believe we need predators to maintain the balance that Mother Nature requires.
Since 2014, this GHO has been attacking my purple martin colony.  Actually, after reviewing my records and with the benefit of hindsight to see patterns, I think it has been longer than that - maybe as early as 2012, but this past year (2016), she decided that she liked this buffet setup and upped her game.
With my monitoring setup, I knew when she first arrived at the beginning of the 2016 season.  But I was prepared - I had everything caged in and I was determined she would get even less meals here this year than she did in 2015.

"*PREVENTION is KEY* - install owl guards BEFORE you have a problem.  Radios (and cds with recorded 'home' noises, including a shot gun), flood lights, red lights on top of racks, scare crows, reflector tape, even setting off firecrackers  - all of those things may temporarily work for a week, even two or three weeks, but he/she will be back."

As she escalated her attacks every week and became more aggressive, I also escalated.  At every turn she made, I was there with a counter-measure.  Everything we tried only worked for one to three weeks, depending on the counter-measure we put in place.  I was often getting up at 3:00 A.M. to scare her off when she came for her early-morning raids; but still my principles held - I refused to kill her.  But I also have a full-time job and couldn't be out there every night to stop her and she took full advantage of my absences.
During the first week of July, she decided it was time to increase her success rate and learn how to get past the barriers that had worked very well the least few years. After returning from a business trip in mid-July, I was stunned to watch a video of her 'walking' around the exterior of the cage attached to the Trendsetter, probing the 4"x4" openings I had made in the wire, meant to make it easier for the martins to enter and exit the wire caging.
It was then that she managed to truly bring me to the edge of a cliff that I didn't want to be on as I watched the next 2 videos.  My heart broke, my chest constricted and my throat went dry.  Despite everything we had in place, she was flushing them out of the housing and grabbing them as they exited their nest boxes. Those that flushed were doomed.
In one of the videos, she dragged one of the martins through the cage hole and landed near the game camera, where I could hear his screeching until he died.  Sobbing doesn't even begin to adequately describe what I was doing when the video ended.
**WARNING - both videos below are difficult to watch, much less listen to....

As I watched from the depths of my despair, my anger flashed beyond boiling.  I thought, "I am done- I have failed them....I no longer know what to do." Even though it was daylight, I was ready to hunt her down and kill her.  My brain was on fire, while my heart simultaneously ached.  It was obvious the caging on the house was too close to the porches, but with the wind load here in Missouri and the fact it had worked for the last 2 years, I hadn't been concerned about it. I stormed through the house, swearing that was the last martin she was going to eat.  She had gone too far.
I went outside to vent my sorrow to the wind and the trees. As I stood in the yard near my gourd racks,  the activity in my colony that day belied the horrors of the night before, making me feel even more devastated.  These resilient birds who had to have heard the dying cries of their brothers, were busily flying to and fro in the hot, bright sunshine, feeding the remaining nestlings.  It was almost surreal. 
My most immediate concern was for the welfare of the remaining nestlings in the house, so, hoping that she wouldn't want to get her wings tangled up with some light-weight twine, I used some mostly-empty bottles to weigh down some twine around the remaining nests.  It worked to save the remaining adults and nestlings.

As the heat intensified that day, I watched the videos above again & again, torturing myself I suppose for losing this battle with the owl.  I deserved the torture. It took a long time to sort my feelings out - months even, but eventually, I realized I was actually more angry at myself than at her. She was doing what any owl or other predator for that matter, would do if they found an easy meal and her mind was only focused on two things - her own survival and that of her owlets which she was likely feeding at the time.
After all the anger, sorrow, despair, crying a river of tears, I received a few emails from a few friends that made me decide I need to pick up my pieces and move forward.  So how do I go forward now?  I have decided that I need to remove the Trendsetter and replace it with another gourd rack, specifically, a Super System gourd rack with a 3" pole, which will allow me to mount a larger cage that will extend further from the openings of the nests and withstand the Missouri winds better.  My Trendsetter has a lot of sentimental value for me, but even extending the cage on it at this point still allows her to flush the martins out at night and this house is obviously now her favorite target.
I have learned so much about owls in the last 2 years and if a new martin landlord asked me about owls today I would tell them, "*PREVENTION is KEY* - install owl guards BEFORE you have a problem."  Once an owl discovers that there is 'food' in those gourds / nestboxes, there will be no stopping him/her - he/ she will be relentless.  Radios (and cds with recorded 'home' noises, including a shot gun), flood lights, red lights on top of racks, scare crows, reflector tape, even setting off firecrackers  - all of those things may temporarily work for a week, even two or three weeks, but he/she will be back and nothing will stop the attacks.  The most absolute best guard against an owl is to setup owl guards as preventative / proactive measures, instead of having to always *react* and be on defense.
The first step to healing is to forgive yourself.  As Dana Ripper from MRBO emailed me, "hopefully you still produced a gazillion babies though"!  It made me smile.  It was the first positive thought I'd had on this topic in a long time.  My friend Greta Webb emailed me and said, "We can learn more from our mistakes than from our successes."  Thank you Dana and Greta...you set me back on my path.
My New Year's resolution was to forgive myself for my mistakes.  With that, I'm moving forward to the 2017 Purple Martin Season, with a look back at the 2016 - which doesn't look like it was so bleak after all. 
Enjoy the video.

Purple Martins and The Sounds of Change

“The earth has music for those who listen.”
― George Santayana

This past weekend as I conducted nest checks (now 79 pair), I listened to the efforts of some of the sub-adult males to alert the colony of my intrusions.  It made me laugh at their silliness when they would suddenly launch themselves and try to get the others to flush with them.  Surely, that would serve to frighten and send this frequent intruder running away in terror!  I could tell who were my 'regulars' as they would sit on their perches, beaks stuffed full with some type of food for their broods and roll their eyes at the enthusiastic efforts of the sub-adults.  Ok, maybe they didn't literally roll their eyes, but figuratively speaking anyway.

How about that Green Darner dragonfly? 

As I brushed at the mites, changed out nests and counted nestlings, I heard a group of birds from my colony sound the alarm call to the west and give chase to a Cooper's hawk.  I continued with my nest check after they had evicted the intruder to a safe distance.  Apparently though, the Cooper's wasn't giving up that easily.  Soon I heard the martins chasing her in the field just south of us, then to the west and finally the hapless predator left for good via the northern route.  I knew my martins would soon return to the perches above my head and start bragging and congratulating each other over their victory - at least that's what it sounds like to this happy martin servant.
A short update on my Great Horned Owl situation- in the last 17 nights, I've only experienced 2 GHO visits.  How cool is that?  Bob has some recording doo-hicky machinery and we spent some time recording stuff around the house..doors slamming, Nikki barking, shell loading in a shotgun, shotgun firing, running on my wooden deck, dropping metal pipes on the deck, cough, cough, - you name it, we recorded it.  I also bought a cheap CD player to do repeated, random playing of the cds too.  Along with that, I bought a plethora of night lights and plugged them into a power strip that's on a timer.  Now I have my scarecrow up on the porch, cd playing random "real life" sounds and the lights turning off & on at different times.  Ironically, the only 2 times the owl has visited has been during the timeframes when I had neglected to turn on the cd player.  We're only a little over 2 weeks into testing this, but I am very hopeful.
Anyway, back to this past weekend.  As I continued my work, I thought of all the different calls the purple martins make during their 5-month stay here at Gobbler's Knob and how I can now recognize the various stages of their nesting cycle, just by listening.  Their greetings are loud and raucous when they first arrive in the spring and they sound like excited schoolchildren on their first day back at school, screeching with delight at the sight of old and new friends.  As the season progresses, the loud, persistent mating calls of the males dominate the airwaves.  Eventually, you know when there are eggs in the nests as the colony overall becomes more subdued and they get down to the business of incubation & keeping the eggs warm, except for the evening bathing, and the quiet social gathering and preening on the perches before bedtime.
At some point, the sub-adults arrive and the routines are thrown off kilter as the mated pairs adjust to dealing with the returns of the teenagers from last year.  As eggs start to hatch, I sometimes have to double check that my colony is still around as they become very quiet while fetching and delivering food to the babies.  The only indication they are still here are the black streaks across the yard of approximately 150 adults on cafeteria duty.

An SY Male (left) tries to act cool as the ASY male prepares an attack on him.

When the babies are big enough, they move to the front of the housing and their constant begging for food starts to dominate my backyard.  As my goal is to fledge as many babies as possible, the persistent cries for food are pleasing to my ears.

Mom bringing home the bacon.  Or, in this case, a large dragonfly is what's for dinner.

As of last weekend, we reached the point at my colony where the fun has really started.  As nestlings are preparing for their first flights, the colony is coming alive with the calls of both resident and non-resident martins flying back and forth, screeching to the nestlings at the entrances, providing enthusiastic encouragement for them to spread their wings and take the leap of faith.  As the adults are returning each evening with their newly-fledged broods (of which I have around 25-30 nests fledged to-date), the parents' calls reverberate off my home as they try to direct their reckless entourage of fledges to return to the nest for the night where they will be safe until dawn.  It's a good thing they start at least 45 to 60 minutes before nightfall, as it takes that long for some of them to be successful.

A family unit of martins coming home late in the evening.

One of the youngsters - a protective Dad stands watch as the youngster gets his bearing on which gourd he needs to enter for the night.

All I have to do is listen to them to know where we're at in each phase.  Check out the list below of the multiple vocalizations performed by Purple Martins (via PMCA)
https://www.purplemartin.org/purple-martins/biology/43/vocalizations/

Vocalization Name	Who Uses/Performs It	Description/Purpose of Vocalization
Juvenile Calls	Juvenile martins	•  Given at fledging time •  Monosyllabic •  Used when begging for food from parents, or when other martins approach the nest •  Also used to alert parents that they are being harassed by predators •  Used on their first flight
Choo Calls	Females	•  Used when escorting fledglings back to the nest •  Used when taking fledglings out to forage •  Mainly at dusk
Zwrack Calls	Males and females	•  Used during alarm or highly aggressive situations •  Given singly •  Used when predator gets too close to the nest, causing the martin to dive-bomb
Hee-Hee Calls	Males	•  Related to territorial defense; usually given after chasing away an intruder •  Given in a series of 4 – 10 calls •  Often given during intraspecific (same species) combat
Zweet Calls	Males and females	•  One-syllable call •  Indicate alarm •  Given in flight when martins fly away from a terrestrial predator, causing others to be more vigilant •  Shows excitement •  Males use this call if they see another male attempting to copulate with his mate
Cher Calls	Males and females	•  Most common vocalization •  Used in many situations including during courtship, when showing contentment, when excited, and when approaching housing •  Sometimes used in conjunction with Zweet and Zwarck calls •  Given when in flight and when at rest •  Usually accompanied by wing and body shaking •  Used mainly during the day but also during pre-dawn hours
Chortle Calls	Males and females	•  Consists of many syllables •  Sometimes used in conjunction with the Cher call •  Usually when showing higher excitement levels •  Both during the day and predawn •  While sitting
Croak Songs	Males	•  Main courtship song •  Directed at mate during egg laying •  Given both before and after copulation •  Also performed during extra-pair copulations •  Given in flight and while perched •  Performed after being rejoined with his mate after being separated for a length of time
Chortle Songs	Females	•  Heard most often during pair formation •  Mainly during courtship •  Given towards other females when approaching their territory
Subsongs	Males	•  Only heard near the end of the nesting season, after breeding •  Performed in a variety of situations •  Most common after birds began feeding their young •  Also common during roosting before migration
Dawnsong*	Males	•  Loudest Purple Martin vocalization •  During early morning hours to attract other subadult males, and thus females to the colony site •  Only sung after the male has established a nest

After all we do for our purple martins; the expense, the work, the worry and frustration, peace in nature and connection with them can be found not only in the observation of their antics, but also in the listening.  I truly hope that everyone is listening to their colonies and embracing the joy and energy they share with us with each and every year.  It's not a lot of trouble - one only needs to listen.

Nest Check Season Begins and Sub-Adults Swarm Missouri

For the last three weeks, I have been swarmed by sub-adult purple martins as they flooded into my site, harassing the already-established pairs.  We must have had a banner year last year and the happy, carefree calls and antics from the sub-adult males as they try to find a mate puts a grin on my face and tears in my eyes as I stop to enjoy the sounds and raw nature of these birds as they focus on their single goal.  Last Saturday afternoon, May 21st, I decided it was the perfect weather to do my first nest check of the season.  With the temperatures being so cold during the prior week and having to feed almost 160 martins, I was dreading nest checks, but I had to know.
As I gathered my tools, the persistent cheeping of the baby bluebirds begging for food from their exhausted parents made it easy to spot this little fellow in the yard.  Unfortunately, I had found feathers from one of his brothers/sisters nearby, indicating the owl had caught one of them.  But this one's a survivor and I was about to discover how my colony was surviving too.

Bob bought a new tool belt for me to hold all the new equipment I now need for my nest checks inside the wire cages.  It has a belt clip on the back to hook over a belt or the waistband of your pants.  It has plenty of small pouches around the outside with a few clips too, and even a magnetized patch for holding screws, nuts or gourd clips.  It has loops inside the main pouch which will hold things in place and a large opening inside for holding bigger items. I've added wire cutters to quickly cut zip ties that hold the wire cage panels on the frame, 3 different sizes of zip ties for various applications, a marker for refreshing gourd numbers, needle nose pliers for pulling the stubborn zip ties tighter, and I put the zip tie discards in the middle open pouch.  As my nestlings get older, I'll safety pin a plastic bag to the side containing an index card.  The index card will be an easy, quick reference list of nest cavities with the older nestlings whose nest needs to be plugged.  This thing has room for much, much more - as long as my pants don't slide down from all the weight.

A picture of my old tool belt (things fell out of it too easily) and tool box.  I still use the tool box to carry all my nest plugs (used for plugging cavities with older nestlings), a bag full of alcohol wipes, and it also makes a nice step stool for the upper gourd levels.

The martins know what's coming when I enter the yard with my tool belt, my tool box, and my white hat, while smelling like Vanilla extract. The old-timers don't mind - they hang out on the cages and perches, awaiting their turn, while the new sub-adults flush and scream to alert everyone that surely, the Vanilla extract I'm wearing will be used create some tasty dish out of all of them.

The martins in the middle rack await their turn.  They know what's coming. But first, I have to remove the ties that hold each panel to the next, so I can slip inside.

I also use a voice recorder for all my nest checks that I pin to my shirt for easy access.  This helps keep my hands free and I don't have to deal with keeping track of a pen & paper in all the chaos too.  I've had this little thing for the last 6 years and it just keeps going & going.  With 84 cavities to check, it is just another tool that helps expedite the process.

Sony voice recorder.

With some dark days behind us with the cool weather and repeated, Great Horned Owl attacks every night, my heart pounded and I could hear the blood rushing through my veins, unsure of what I would find. 

To my delight, I found 54 pair of nesting purple martins, which is 8 pair ahead of last year around the same part of May, along with 264 eggs and 10 young nestlings.  Still, I didn't know which way my numbers were trending, so I waited another week before breathing a sigh of relief with another nest check completed this past Saturday, May 28th.  I am so excited to report my total pair number increased to 71 pair, 306 eggs and 40 young.  YIPPEEEE!!! 

Since adding the roof over the top of the house cage and extending the bottom of the wire, the owl has been visiting less frequently. I've also been going out just before complete dark and shooing the sub-adults off the porches.

In 2014 and 2015, I had 76 total pair each year and this year, I'm on track for the same total, if not more this year.  Despite the best efforts of the GHO, my martins are surging ahead with their work.  Establishing nests, finding mates and supplying food to the ever-growing number of nestlings.  During the day, you would never know what terrors they have experienced.  They may not forget the night before, but they're moving on quickly & efficiently with their lives, obviously enjoying this moment - the present.  I think I need to be more like my purple martins too - enjoy this moment, for today, we are still the survivors.

New Season, More Changes

On Saturday, 3/26 it reached 69 degrees on Gobbler's Knob. But with the ever-present Spring wind, it felt a bit cooler - maybe 68 degrees.  Heh! Oh, but it was so beautiful and there was absolutely no way, I was going to stay indoors.  I was quite surprised when I flushed my martins - it appears my 84 cavity colony is already 1/2 full!  I've never been that full by this time of year before.
My first priority was to finish up my owl cages on my Deluxe gourd racks.  My jerry-rigged, owl interference didn't work as well on those racks last year and I've no doubt that I'll be seeing my Great Horned Owl again this year and possibly, my Barred Owl as well.
I would have caged these 2 racks last year, however, I could never come up with an idea that would work, both because these racks had no place to mount homemade supports for the wire and there were also weight considerations (it's windy here in the spring!).  In summer of 2015, we figured out what we needed to do.  I ordered the same stainless steel arms for these racks from the original manufacturer, only the length of these arms would be changed to 36" and they would have the same gourd mounting holes as the originals.  I ordered 8 arms per rack as that would be enough to support the type of wire cage I needed to build.
Here's what my racks looked like last year, just using garden stakes as a 'cage' to interfere with any owl messing with them.

I decided that I would use 4 panels of 4 foot-high welded-mesh wire fencing, per rack.  Each panel is cut to 56" wide, allowing me to bow them out almost 10" from the front of each gourd.  I was surprised how light the 4 panels were, as I gathered them up and carried them out to the first rack.  The top of each panel is mounted on a stainless steel rod and I added the heavy duty garden stakes along the top in between the new stainless rods, to add more support.

Note the two new, extra long stainless rods. Each panel is cinched together with a heavy duty zip tie, tightening it down on the rod.

Heavy duty zip ties hold together the edges of each panel in place on the rods.  The inside white zip tie is there only to keep the yellow tie & wire from sliding inward.

A smaller zip tie was added inside on just the rod (not holding anything), but will help keep the outside yellow zip tie from sliding inward.

The tops of the panels are all zip-tied to the garden stakes and the top wire 'ceiling' along the way, closing all the gaps at the top.  All I have to do is cut the 3 zip ties holding each panel to the next at the seam, leaving the zip ties at the top that hold it to the extra heavy rods on the top, lift the panel up and walk in.

Each rectangle is 2" wide - you can see the cage is at least 10" out in front of each gourd entrance.

As with my other rack that I enclosed a couple of years ago, I will need to work a little more slowly and be more cognizant of where my face is at all times, since some martins tend to flush out of the gourd at the very last second.
The fencing is 48" high so it drops below the most bottom gourds about 6".  I will have to monitor to see if that's going to be sufficient

East Rack - 3/26/2016

Mid Rack - 3/26/2016

Each cage took 35 - 40 minutes to install and I was really glad that I made the changes early in the day, since it took the colony some time to adjust to their new surroundings. So, 38 feet of mesh wire fencing, a couple of packs of zip ties, some heavy duty stainless steel rods, 24 feet of undersill trim to make some nice, 4"x4" landing spots, a handy pair of wire cutters and a good pair of leather work gloves and I'll be able to better sleep at night.  I think my most stressful time last year was when the new fledges came home late in the evening and hunkered down on the inside gourd arms.  I knew those 'easy catches' were going to attract the owl and I spent many hours & nights outside with them, trying to gently encourage them inside or leave the site. With these new cages, they can safely roost on the arms if they want and stick their tongues out at the GHO when she comes.
Some were initially frightened by the changes, fluttering around and around the outside of the cages, while others flew under and straight up to their gourd without missing a beat.  Some ended up hanging upside down on the cage, and some landed on top and dropped right through to their gourd.  Some of the territorial fighting resumed, with the males quickly reclaiming their gourds as their competitors dropped through the top of the wire in full battle mode, proving that each of these birds have their own character and personality as unique as we humans.
I had a really hard time not laughing out loud (and I can laugh really loud) at some of the antics in this video.  Enjoy!

A Welcome Home and Saying Goodbye to an Old Friend

My apologies - I'm a bit behind this year with my reporting, since I've been on work travel to Germany.  But now that I'm back, it's time to get back into the swing of things and nothing makes me feel more rooted again than getting outside and preparing all the bluebird, tree swallow and purple martin housing.  Spring has come so early this year and has definitely caught me off guard!
On Sunday, February 28th, while still in Germany, I received an email from my husband.  It was 7 AM his time and a single adult male purple martin had just arrived at my site!  This is the first time a martin has arrived at my site in February.  The earliest arrival ever was March 12th.  Thank goodness I had uncovered my Trendsetter before I left on the trip!  Bob quickly added some pine needles to help provide some warmth at night, when the temps were still dipping down into the low 30's.

Many of my martins are already pairing up.

Two days after the purple martin arrived, on March 1st - the first tree swallow of the year also appeared.  As of yesterday, I now have over 20 martins.  I guess the one thing I can say about hosting purple martins - every year is different!

First Tree Swallow of the season. As of 3/20/2016, there are now over 17 TRES here.

This year, I've made some changes to my PMCA Deluxe Racks so they will be better protected from my local Great Horned Owl.  I'll be posting about that exercise in a couple of weeks! I haven't seen him/her this year but back in late December, I did get to watch this Barred Owl hunting in the north Savanna early morning fog for about an hour.

One of my friends made this very cool rendering of one of the photos I made.  Pretty neat! Hopefully, he/she won't also decide purple martins are on the menu this summer. :(

While getting back in the swing of things, I noticed my list of Missouri landlords has grown to 73!  I'll be writing more about our small, growing community and some of its members later this spring, but I wanted to first write about a very special landlord who was also a very dear, cool friend.
Bob Peterson was one of the first people we met when we moved to Licking 10 years ago.  He owned C-Hwy Garage north of town and my father-in-law introduced us when we were trying to find a part for an old used tractor we had. As I became more educated about hosting purple martins, I began to take notice of his purple martin house.  It was a very old S&K house and he had 3 pairs of HOSP and 1 pair of martins in it during summer of 2009.  I asked him if he enjoyed hosting purple martins and he said, "Yes, if only I could get rid of those "chippies".  I asked him if he'd like some help, which of course he accepted and that started my friendship with him.  After 4 days, we had trapped and eliminated over 55 English House Sparrows.  We cleaned out his house and that summer, he hosted 3 pairs of martins and he fledged 9 young.
After learning more about starlings and house sparrows, and doing nest checks, Bob was hooked.  He came to all of my open houses and presentations and quickly became an advocate for purple martins also, obtaining 10 copies of my newsletter and distributing it to everyone he knew each month. In spring of 2011, Bob, being his usual creative self, tore down his old house and using supplies he found around his junk yard and the knowledge I had gathered for him on the internet, built a gourd rack out of 3" steel pipe and an old satellite dish.  After 3 days, it was ready to go and I went over to celebrate its christening with 8 new Troyer Vertical gourds.  That first year, Bob had 8 pair of martins.

When it came to banding time, Bob didn't want to miss out on the event.  He was here every time and he helped keep the nestlings moving and me organized.  He loved it and he loved learning.  

On July 3, 2013, I was so thrilled for him when he called and told me he thought he had a banded bird at his colony.  What were the odds that someone from 6 miles away who had probably handled that same bird as a nestling, would attract one of them to his site?  We confirmed that day, PUMA band # A675 (an adult male purple martin banded at my site on July 6, 2011) at his site and that bird was still at his colony last year as he hosted 22 pair. Bob had a quick and clever mind.  And I don't think I've ever met a more dependable friend - you could call and before you finished your question, he had already come up with a solution for whatever it was you were asking about. When my husband needed to find a disc to tear up some ground for a new orchard, Bob arrived that weekend with his old tractor and disc and he and my husband had it ready with a few hours.

He was a master gardener and it especially thrilled him to introduce young children to the joy of growing their own vegetables.  Bob would call and laugh as he told me how 'his' purple martins would fly low over his head and try to scare him off as he lowered the rack to do nest checks.  He was preparing to put up a second gourd rack this year before the season started.  On Saturday, March 5th, he walked through my mind as I thought about calling him and asking him if he was ready to put it up yet but, I didn't make that call.  On Monday, March 7th, I was deeply saddened to find out he had died on Friday, March 4th.  Bob was 60 years old.
I'm not sure yet what will happen to Bob's colony or if A675 will return this year.  I haven't been able to bring myself to go over to visit his family and find out what will happen to his colony yet.  I'm sure if his rack is taken down, his family will be erecting it near their own homes as they love purple martins as much as Bob did.  But one thing is for sure - Bob will be missed.  I will miss his quirkiness and his quick-witted retorts, but most of all, his martins will most certainly miss him.