Purple Martin Forum

They've been some scattered sightings of PM's around Moore County in south -central North Carolina over the past week and a half, but today a pair showed up at my daughter's small colony in Southern Pines. March 18th. I'll have to remember this date. Here's the interesting part, and others may have ...

Sorry you have to give it up......I grew up in Chester County...after leaving Delaware County in 1960. Then left in 1980 for California. At one time I had all the colonies in Delaware County mapped out, and worked on the ones in Chester County too. There was that great colony in downtown Downingtown...

No, this can't bode well. I see the first bird has just been recorded in North Carolina, near Lumberton. That's only about 20 minutes for a martin away from me. We've had ice and freezing rain for 4 days on this date in past years. We've got a few cold days (40's) forecast for next week but then in ...

Hi condor man. I totally understand you want to prevent a mite infestation!! I’ve been through that once! No fun. But DE isn’t a good choice in my humble opinion. It gets airborne inside the compartment, and the martins can inhale it. It is like minuscule shards of glass getting into their lungs. Y...

Avian Insect Liquidator. AIL. Bought in concentrate or ready to use spray. Simple, easy, extremely safe and very effective. Or sevin dust 5% around edges of nests. " Hey Dave. I did buy the Avian Insect Liquidadtor...not cheap for a small spray bottle. Thanks for that advice. Have had trouble ...

So when I was there, 1987-1990 there was a large martin roost in the neighborhood just south of Doddridge St. I want to say it was Pearlman St., but I'm not sure if that was the street or the owner of the home. The roost was in a large ash tree in the front yard on the northeast corner of the 4 way ...

I lived in Corpus Christi from 1987-1990 at 325 Doddridge Street, a couple of blocks from the bay. Started a colony of martins there but it was the year, maybe 1989, when there was this real scarcity of insects. I drove from CC to Austin with no insects hitting my windshield. At the colony I started...

Sounds like a good arsenal suggested for next year. I like the idea of spraying the housing with Liquidator first, then seven dust under the nest. A friend just found a large bag of the older seven dust in his mother's old greenhouse. That sounds like what I used to use. No question martins historic...

Thanks Les, I wondered what insecticide you used? In the mid-1970's when I was first color banding martins as nestlings I used powdered Sevin dust mixed with water and sprayed that in the nesting material, and then put a handful of red cedar shavings in the nest cup. That really eliminated the mites...

As a follow-up this colony eventually had 4 pair, and as of this date all pairs were successful. Young are fledging as of this date, 7/02-03/24. It's interesting to note that just within the past two days the adults have stopped spending the night at the colony and depart about 1/2 before dusk. Last...

Over the summer I have been periodically checking on a nearby colony owned by some relatively new folks to purple martin management. They had an old T-14 house that had fallen into disrepair and was no longer used and when I said I would restore the house and get it back up on a proper pole, they be...

I saw the same issue up here in North Carolina 2 years ago where home owners put up one of the plastic12 room houses with the crescent entrance holes. Two years ago was the first year and I watched SY males and their mates refuse to go in the crescent holes. I thought maybe the manufacturer had made...

In case you're in a desperate situation with snakes getting up to or about to get up to your martin housed here's a case where we quickly tied into a livestock fence. The pole is wrapped in a 2' piece of rubberized mat taped in place with rubberized duct tape, then that's wrapped in stainless steel ...

Thomabear, Thanks so much for your reply. We just wanted to get some feedback that we were on the right path. We're heading out now to set it up. Its is kind of a RubeGoldberg set up but I just wanted to get the birds protected over the next month and a half while there will be young in the nests. (...

The two aluminum houses I have are on my daughter's horse farm and the poles are mounted to the pasture fence. The fence has an electric wire running across the top to keep the horses from chewing on the fence. So, I have electricity. We had gotten to the point in our thoughts of wrapping the poles ...

The two aluminum houses I have are on my daughter's horse farm and the poles are mounted to the pasture fence. The fence has an electric wire running across the top to keep the horses from chewing on the fence. So, I have electricity. We had gotten to the point in our thoughts of wrapping the poles ...

The two aluminum houses I have are on my daughter's horse farm and the poles are mounted to the pasture fence. The fence has an electric wire running across the top to keep the horses from chewing on the fence. So, I have electricity. We had gotten to the point in our thoughts of wrapping the poles ...

Hello fellows, this is Jesse in Southern Pines, North Carolina. Just getting my first colony going this year with two aluminum houses I got from folks that have had failures (pretty sure snakes) and have given up. I retrofitted the houses by adding 3/4" wooden fronts to each compartment on the ...