Missouri Purple Martins - A Mid-Season Update

All the native wildflowers are in bloom, creating a fantastic palette of colors and fragrances and drawing in a variety of bugs - aka, "bird food".

Sensitive Briar

While some areas have suffered from drought and a lack of food for their purple martins, the deeper roots of our native wildflowers and grasses have resulted in blooms everywhere, attracting many varieties of bees, butterflies and other insects that I can't even identify.  Our birds are having a field day.  Literally....

Purple Coneflower

Indian Pink

Ohio Horsemint, Bee Balm and Butterfly milkweed

The variety of bugs the purple martins are bringing in are fascinating.  The best ID of the insect in the picture below that I could come up with is "Great Purple Hairstreak".  If anyone has a better ID, please let me know.

We have reached the part of the season where not only are the temperatures starting to soar, but the number of housekeeping chores for my birds as well.  One of the things I've learned about being a purple martin landlord is that if I do the required nest changes at the right times (ie, nestlings 12-16 days old), to rid the martin nests of their bedbugs, then I'll have less "jumpers".  Jumpers as in dehydrated, underfed and mite-stressed nestlings. This is the part of the season that I both love & hate - I HATE the heat, but I LOVE the experience and knowing I'm really doing something that contributes to the future health of mine and my neighbor's colonies.
From the PMCA website:

Tests conducted by the PMCA in the late 1980’s showed that only 44% of martin  nestlings in parasite-infested nests survived to fledging age, compared to 84% in parasite-free nests. The man who conducted those tests, James  R.  Hill,  III, stated, “The  difference might actually have been greater than what was measured, because the young raised in the absence of parasites seemed fat and healthy, and probably had a higher-than-average first-year survival rate, whereas the young subjected to parasites seemed thin and often sickly, making them less likely to survive after fledging.”

Read more here at the PMCA site about Nest Changes: https://www.purplemartin.org/uploads/media/how-why-to-do-nest-r-332.pdf

As of June 19th, I had 57 nests that needed a nest change. Yes, 57 nests.  I currently have 76 pairs (3 new since June 15th!), so a whopping 75% of all my nests need changing.  At first, I was shocked.  Then I was kind of thrilled. Then I was kind of overwhelmed.  In 95+ degree weather.  All due on the same day. This is the first season I've had where the majority of my nestlings are all around the same age at this point in the season.  The nightly return of fledges is going to be thrilling...and will also require some monitoring to deter hawk predation.

Taking an Evening Break - Purple Martins bathing at the pond.

With the heat index around 102 degrees (real temps around 92-93), I started on my first rack on 6/20 (12 nests out of 18 on that rack). When I lowered them, my eyes immediately zeroed in on 3 gourds that were almost grey-colored due to the overwhelming number of mites. I had to wonder how many of those rained down on me when I was lowering my racks.
Here is what a gourd looks like when it's overloaded with mites. You have to wonder, how can they even sleep at night with all those mites??

Troyer Horizontal gourd covered with an explosion of mites.
Special thanks to Betty Farthing Grigg on the PMCA Forum for the use of the photo above.

Special thanks to Courtney Rousseau of the North Carolina Purple Martin Group for providing the video below of a gourd infested with mites!

Nevertheless, I pushed through and with alcohol wipes and a cold-water hose, I managed to survive, even though it took almost 2 hours for my head and my body to cool back down.

Thankfully, the last 3 days have been a lot cooler as I worked through the remaining racks. After the first 2 racks, I was thrilled to find that only 2 nests out of 36 had lost a total of 2 nestlings.  The rest were very fat and healthy.  Even my 2 nests with 7 nestlings in the first two gourd racks were doing exceptionally well. Yesterday, when I finished up the nest changes on my last rack, I concluded that I have "fat baby syndrome" and it's consistent across all my racks. It also indicated to me that while I had initially lost a few martins at the beginning of the season - probably some to the owl and some to the hawks - the majority of my nests have 2 parents that are keeping up with the grocery shopping.  I did find one nest with 4 dead young, so I suspect the owl / hawks got both parents of those. Fortunately, it was only one. I also had mixed feelings over discovering 2 new nests with 4 & 5 eggs respectively. They will be hatching around July 5th or so and probably not fledging until end of July / beginning of August, meaning another extended season for me.
So, total pairs - 76 with currently 360 nestlings!  Hoping to maintain something close to that over the next few weeks.

Nest Change Tips:

1. Dabbing a small amount of vanilla extract around your eyes, nose and mouth will help keep the gnats away from those areas of your face.

2.  Check your tool box before you start your nest changes to ensure you will have the needed equipment within easy reach. The last thing you want to do is go digging around to find something while you're simultaneously swatting at mites & bugs and the sun is overheating your brain!

3. Soak 6-8 paper towels with 91% rubbing alcohol, store in a Ziploc bag and add them to your tool box. These will be handy for wiping down your hands, arms and the gourds when there are just more mites than you can bear.

4. Your son's old white, light-weight, big & baggy karate pants make excellent nest-check pants! They are cool, loose and you can kneel on the ground without all the itchy grass tickling your leg.

5. Always assume that whatever you touch after nest changes are completed will also become contaminated with mites until you thoroughly wash your hands and arms.  Filling a large bucket with water and a having a bar of soap nearby will provide you with some much-needed relief after a round of nest changes.

Check out this post from 2016 for a more detailed list of the tools in my tool kit:  http://kathyfreeze.blogspot.com/2016/05/nest-check-season-begins-and-sub-adults.html

Milkweed, milkweed and More Milkweed

The common milkweed I planted on this bank is spreading!  Check out the video to see how much.

I was awarded this grant by Monarch Watch and now have all these milkweeds plants that need to be planted.  Check out the video below.
Don't know why I'm giggling at the end of the video.  

Nest Checks, New Hatchlings and Nets

My last nest check revealed I have 73 pair so far, with a total of 84 gourds offered.  I continue to be amazed at the resiliency of the purple martin, especially since the Great Horned Owl persists with her attacks.  As an added challenge this year, I've also had a problem now with the Barred Owl attacking my tree swallow and bluebird housing.
But for now, back to my GHO update.  On the morning of April 30th, I became quite alarmed to see the GHO has, after 3 years with these cages, now figured out how to get up and inside to perch on the inside arms of the rack.

After 2 days or mourning and feeling sorry for myself, I decided to cowgirl-up and my husband and I designed a "cargo net" style bottom which would balance the need of the purple martins to both exit quickly when a hawk attacked as well as serve to keep the GHO out. With the mandatory requirement of it being "quick release" so that I could continue with nest checks, we purchased some polypropylene rope, zip ties, quick release clips and some garden stakes.  The first 'net' picture you see below has 14x12" holes in it - I can always adjust the size of these holes if the owl gets through, but since the owl's wingspan ranges from 36"-60", I'm hoping I don't have to change these.  The 4 long ropes are crossed by 6 shorter ropes, tied together using zip ties at each crossing.

I've put together the video below to show other landlords how the netting is connected to the cages and how it quick releases for nest checks.  I made a mistake in the video - the rope is called, "polypropylene".  :)

For the round racks, a different approach was used to the the netting.

While the owl has definitely made my nest checks a little more time-consuming, my husband has always helped me come up with ideas to enable me to keep doing them. Given the heat & humidity we experience here in Missouri during the summer, it's imperative that I know the ages of the kids, because inevitably, I will have a few nestlings that will either get knocked off porches or they will jump and I need to know in which nest to put them back.
New "pinkies"!

Photo taken by my friend, Lu Ann Coons at her colony site here in Missouri.

It was very apparent the nest in the video below had just started hatching.  While it's tempting to help remove the shells from the little, adorable nestlings, because their skin is still so delicate and could be still attached to the shell, I never 'help'. I let Nature take its course - the baby will be stronger for it and I avoid damaging him/her.

View From the Porch - The Fish Thief

For the last few days, my colony has been under siege by a female Cooper's hawk and a smaller hawk - not sure if it's a Sharpie or a small male Cooper's hawk. Nevertheless it was a beautiful day complete with boathorns, setting up / relocating decoys, filling bird feeders and nest checks. No eggs yet, thankfully!
Feeling very accomplished, Bob and I relaxed on the back porch to watch the martins and listen for the dreaded "alarm system" indicating the hawk was back. Bob saw it first circling over the pond and said, "is that the @$!? hawk coming back again"? Some martins and tree swallows did seem alarmed by the presence of this guy.
Me: "No, that's too big for a Cooper's hawk".  And within 3 seconds, the large raptor folded its wings back and dove toward the pond.  Pulling up at the last second with feet outstretched, it still splashed into the water and flopped around for 3-4 seconds, before finally becoming airborne again.  We watched in amazement - me squealing in delight, as it displayed its catch to us, departing southward. But the fun wasn't over yet. Suddenly we noticed and identified a large eagle rapidly approaching from the east - straight-lined flying, hellbent and focused on catching the first raptor - later identified as an Osprey.  The eagle looked like an F-18 as he zeroed in on the Osprey.  That guy had just stolen food from the eagle's territory and it was not going to be allowed to get away with it!
Oh and me without a video or picture camera.
As the eagle closed the distance rapidly, the Osprey tried to circle to evade, but finally gave up its precious catch, dropping it in our neighbor's hayfield. The eagle broke off its attack and quickly dove to the ground to claim the large bass.
I managed to sprint indoors to grab my binoculars. When I managed to finally get the Osprey into focus, I found there were actually two of them slowly beginning to ascend again and moving away.
I searched the skies and identified a juvenile eagle coming in from the east as well...apparently still following its parents and learning the skills required for hunting.
This morning, I wasn't even entertaining the thought of the Osprey pair returning, when suddenly I spotted it beginning a slow circle of our pond again. Silly me, STILL with no movie camera. Hey, THIS time I am going to capture it on video.  Unfortunately, my excitement caused me to fat-finger, thumb and push all the wrong buttons at the wrong time and this is all I captured.  At least I have proof this time.

I'm going to have a hard time accomplishing everything I had planned for the day today, while I'm running in & out of the house trying to see if they are back.
Oh, and how many fish do Osprey eat everyday?
Check out the video below - not the best, but I'll keep practicing.

Eggs Already?

No, we don't have purple martin eggs yet, but we do have other eggs being laid here already!  The weather is so weird, it's easy to forget that it's only April 20th. On the other hand, it's ONLY April 20th!  Bob had been spotting a pair of Canadian Geese on our pond for over a week now. I'm not particularly fond of Canadian Geese - there's nothing special about them - they're everywhere and they are so messy!  In my most self-assured voice, I told him surely, they'll be moving on.  Tonight, as we drove around the property and then the pond on our 4-wheelers, a female goose took off honking wildly.
As I scanned the bank, I saw why she was acting so alarmed and suddenly, in a blink, my indifference to geese turned into endearment.

She has 5 eggs softly nestled in a downy feather cup she has created on the bank of the pond and I'm pretty sure she didn't count on having such a nosy neighbor. I studied the site and oriented myself so I could figure out from where I could observe her in the future while standing at a safe distance on our porch. I noticed one egg in the water and I felt a bit bad.  I don't know if she accidentally kicked the egg out when I drove up, or if it had been discarded before I even got there.

I made a decision not to try to rescue the egg as I had no idea how geese will react when you fuss around their nests and I figured the cold water had already ruined it.
Ma and Pa stayed in the next field over, watching me from a distance.

After what seemed like hours, (it was really only about 20-25 minutes), they both returned to the pond and she made her way up the bank, re-positioned herself on the nest and settled in for the night, while dad quietly paddled around to make sure the area was once again safe for his little family. 

On my way back to the house, I stopped to check on our Killdeer nest - 3 eggs have now become 4. There are 2 things that always amaze me about Killdeer - one is HOW do they get away with not being caught at night by snakes and owls?  The second is, HOW does she manage to keep those eggs so warm at night with such cold weather here right now?  It has been getting as low as mid-20's lately.

I did some quick research and found that goose eggs can take as long as 28-35 days to incubate. Of course I don't know how long those eggs have been there, so I'll have to keep a daily watch on them, if I want to see the kids hatch. Regardless of my lack of interest in geese, I am now excited about having baby goslings swimming around my pond. Ma and Pa had better get used to me hanging around - it's the price every living thing must pay while living here at Gobbler's Knob.

Of Missouri Sunsets, Spring and Purple Martins

After a few days of cold, wet miserable weather - including SNOW, I decided to go outside the last few evenings to check on my purple martin population and observe them as they rain down from the sky at dusk.  On Monday night, my camera battery died pretty quickly.  Just swell. But Tuesday night, I was re-charged and prepared.  Only I really wasn't prepared for what Mother Nature has been up to the last few days.
After last year's drama of having to deal with a lot-more-than-usual hawk attacks (8-10 per day - we think a male & female Cooper's hawk) we removed a few more trees this past winter.  So far, this has been a huge improvement...(knocking on wood).
The guidelines for attracting martins state that you need 40' of open space around your colony, but there are many other factors involved in that, not only for attracting, but also keeping them safe.  Even though they were 150' away, the hawks were using the cedar trees as cover and coming up the East side low & fast behind them, then launching surprise attacks on my new fledges. So, in the end, the trees had to go.

Still, I'm engaging every tool in my arsenal to fight back against any hawk attacks, including my little 'winged orcas' and bird-feeding stations surrounding my colony on all sides, setup halfway between the woods and the gourd racks.

My "Winged Orcas"

In my particular case, the noise from my colony attracts hawks, more than any birds at a bird feeder.
The birds at the East feeding station were on duty, doing their part. They work-for-food...notice I didn't say, "for free", but since chicken scratch is only $7.50 a bag at our local MFA, let's just call them, "cheap labor" and "free decoys".

The birds at the West feeding station were also on duty - same labor prices.  When I'm out & about with my martins, I keep one eye on these feeding stations so I can gauge whether a predator is nearby.

While waiting for the martins to return, I made a video of my little winged orcas (tree swallows) and all the other bird activity around my site. I was surprised at how many birds I could hear on the video when I played it back on my computer. I had only been 'listening' for alarm calls while outside and didn't really realize how many birds have already arrived this spring!

Take a listen - how many birds can you identify by their calls in the below video? I'll give you a hint - there are NO English house sparrows or starlings!

At 7:08 PM a small group of eight martins started circling the gourd racks. By 7:24 PM - still only seeing 8 martins, I thought I may have been off by a factor of 12 when I had informed a fellow purple martin landlord that I thought I had approximately 100 martins here now.
But at 7:31 PM, it started raining martins from the sky and I had to force myself to turn off the video camera periodically as I tried to keep watch for any approaching hawks and enjoy the show at the same time.  And wow, WHAT a show - a brilliant sunset AND over 100 purple martins!  I had such a delightful evening.
The sound in the video below is just as I heard it - no enhancements have been made. I did have to blend multiple videos together, as I had to frequently turn it off and on, so I could walk around and continue to monitor for hawks. To enjoy the video below, click on the YouTube icon and open in full-screen mode.

I love these evenings - partly cloudy paired with the setting sun causing these rapidly changing colors, along with loud, raucous purple martin chatter and no hawks. Good night, my lovelies! Tomorrow is another day!

Don't Blink

For the last 8 weeks, I have been seeing 15 to 20 crows around Gobbler's Knob. For awhile, they were just 'noise' in the background that I could hear on my frequent ventures outside.
But, as I sat in my office one morning I saw a buzzard flying in from the North, bobbing up and down and weaving as if he / she were drunk.  It was weaving and coming in so low in fact, I thought it was going to crash into my office window. Hot on its tail were my murder of crows.
A few days later, Bob was taking Nikki for a walk around the property. The Great Horned Owl flushed and flew a couple hundred feet into a nearby tree, with the crows in pursuit, constantly cawing and harassing her.  At that point, it dawned on me I should figure out how I could use these noisy, wonderful troublemakers to my advantage.  It has been amusing to watch them chase the Red Tails, Northern Harriers, Cooper's, and the Red-Shouldered hawks as they hunt across the fields. Unfortunately, it always seemed to be happening when I am without one of my cameras.
So, to keep the crows around and the owls distracted, the south east field is now prepped to draw  their attention away from my purple martins.  We scattered over 35 lbs of chicken scratch (containing cracked corn and milo) here - what doesn't get eaten will grow...and that's ok too.

 We even provided private, reserved perching for our GHO and our Barred owl.

Last Friday, Mar. 23rd, I had counted 18 purple martins when they came in for the evening.  This past Saturday however, there was a noticeable difference in their chatter & activities and I watched my gourd racks as purple martins rained down from the sky. It was windy and 65 degrees. This video was taken around 11 AM - there are a lot in the air behind me as I was filming them coming in and claiming their gourds....and the way they navigate the owl cages - they've obviously been here before.
(click on the video below, then the "YouTube" link to embiggen the screen)

As I stood outside Saturday evening, Mar. 24th, I expected to count 18-20 again. At first, I only counted 12 returning home as the sun began to set and I thought the rest had either moved on, or I had been mistaken on Friday. As the sky darkened though, I heard martins behind me and above - seeming to suddenly materialize out of the clouds. I spun round & round, trying to spot and count them, as more small groups appeared from every direction. Way up high, a familiar shape circled the quarter moon. By the time every martin had descended and was safely tucked in a gourd, I had counted 35 martins.  Yes, 35 martins.  On March 24th. The only year that number was exceeded was in 2014 - and that ended up being a horrible year where I had to feed them ... a LOT.  In fact, here are my counts from previous years:

• March 26, 2008 - 1 ASY male purple martin arrived
• March 24, 2009 - 1 ASY male & 1 ASY female arrived
• March 15, 2010 - 1 ASY female martin arrived (by 3/24 - there were 4 here)
• March 7, 2011 - 1 ASY female martin arrived (by 3/24 - there were 12 here)
• March 13, 2012 - 2 ASY male martins arrived (by 3/24 - there were 24 here)
• March 9, 2013 - 1 ASY female arrived (by 3/24 - there were 22 here)
• March 10, 2014 - 1 ASY male arrived (by 3/24 - there were 100 - 110 here)
• March 15, 2015 - 1 ASY male arrived
• February 28, 2016 - 1 ASY female arrived (by 3/24 - there were 25-30 here)
• March 4, 2017 - 1 ASY female and male arrived (by 3/24 - there were 25-30 here)
• February 19, 2018 - 1 ASY male arrived (by 3/24- there are 35+ here)

I currently have 5000 crickets in the freezer and I'm really hoping I don't have to use them this year. At the very least, it's starting to look like it's going to be another interesting year.

Much to my delight, I received another visit from my Barred Owl (who has NOT been spotted attacking my purple martin racks) on March 28th at 10:15 AM. I can't help myself - I could watch her all day.  This nestbox is less than 150' from my office window and wouldn't ya know it - she always shows up when I'm on a work conference call.

I can't help but wonder how any of my cavity-nesters - bluebirds, chickadees, tufted titmice, or tree swallows would ever feel comfortable using this nestbox for the season. Yet, I've never seen her chasing any of my birds - in fact, the purple martins were out chattering on the racks on the opposite side of the house at the same time this video was taken. When the GHO was spotted during daylight a few days ago, the first sign that a predator was around was the loud warning calls of the Cardinals and Blue Jays that were flitting about where she had decided to roost.  Oddly enough, those same birds do not seem to react in the same manner when the Barred owl is around. Since I've seen her on this post a lot using it as a hunting perch, she must be having success to keep coming back to it. I was actually happy to see her.  I had read that GHOs would either kill or drive a Barred owl out of its territory, so I was glad to see she was still alive.  As I frequently discover, the 'rules' don't always apply here at Gobbler's Knob.
The New England Asters, Bee Balm and other native wildflowers are starting to sprout in my garden already. The dandelions and Bradford pear trees are blooming and providing some much-needed food for the honey bee hive I found in my wood duck box.
All the signs are clear - so, come on Spring - the martins are ready, the plants are ready and now I'm ready - let's get to it!