Bluebirds Welcome
If You Build it, They Will Come
In Washington's South Puget Sound, western bluebirds arrive each spring to nest in rare oak-studded prairies covered in blue camas flowers and chocolate lilies.
But the birds have faced a housing shortage in recent decades because of a lack of natural tree cavities and too much competition from non-native birds. Now, local school kids have come to their rescue, welcoming bluebirds with 100 custom-built wooden nest boxes.
The work of Project Bluebird, a partnership between The Nature Conservancy in Washington, The Tumwater School District, and other public and private groups, has helped the local bluebird population, with 12 pairs nesting in the boxes in 2005 and more expected this year. In the 1970s, bluebirds had virtually disappeared from the South Sound area.
Nationwide, other cavity-nesting species, including the brown-headed nuthatch, oak titmouse and prothonotary warbler, have ended up on conservation lists because of the short supply of nest holes.
The culprit is suburban sprawl, which has diminished prime nesting habitat while leading to increased populations of non-native house sparrows and European starlings, which compete for the limited number of natural cavities, says David Mehlman, director of The Nature Conservancy's Migratory Bird Program.
"This is a real problem for species like bluebirds that can't make their own cavities but must rely on old ones made by woodpeckers," states Mehlman. When no cavities are available, these birds simply may not nest.
Give a Bird a Home:
- Put up the right boxes. Consider the habitat in your yard and determine which cavity-nesting birds frequent your region. Bluebirds prefer houses made from untreated pine or cedar, mounted on a metal pole with an entrance hole one and a half inches in diameter (slightly larger for western bluebirds). You'll know you have bluebirds if the nest inside is in the shape of a cup woven from grass.
- Position boxes in preferred locations. For example, bluebirds and American kestrels prefer open grassy areas; tufted titmice like the edge of a woods.
- Don't chop down dead or dying trees unless they present a safety hazard. Cavity-nesting birds like them. Woodpeckers especially will excavate nesting holes in dead trees but rarely take up in birdhouses.
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Comments: 12
Magi
P.S. What about the cats? They're a huge problem in Australia.
Magi
Please submit this article to Nature Stories.
There are several "predator baffles" and other precautions that will help to prevent ceatures such as cats,snakes,etc from raiding your nest boxes.
Two things to NEVER do:
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1. Never mount your boxes to a tree,or fence post.
Snakes,cats,and other predators can EASILY climb trees and posts.
2. Always put your houses in an area a fair distance away from anything that predators can climb.
An open field is PERFECT.
Here is a good mounting system for your bluebird boxes.
(I use it myself)
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Mount your birdhouse on a steel pole
Put together a long section of stove pipe
Cut a round piece of wood just small enough to fit inside one end of the pipe
Screws through the pipe,and screwed into the wood will make it stronger.
Drill a hole in the center of the wood slightly larger than the diameter of the pole
Place a collar on the pole,and slide the piece of pipe (open end down) so the wood inside the pipe is resting on top of the collar you put on the pole.
This way the pipe will slide upward if pushed from beneath by a predator.
A little "axle grease" applied to the pole will help the pipe slide upward easier,and make the pole more difficult for a predator to climb as well.