Purple Martin Forum

B-Thrash, Beautiful rig you've got there. I'm a hawk guy and flew kestrels and red-tails to the lure back in the day. Have swallow-tail kites swooping over my martin colony but they seem too slow to be a threat to my birds. Remember when we erect devices that attract martins, we attract predators th...

Hello to all and a Happy Easter, Dropped my colony today and here are my results. 65 gourds with good nests and what I am calling "maybes", 7 gourds looked like they just came from the box they were shipped in and I put them on the racks yesterday and a total egg count of 190. The 190 coun...

Forgetful Fog here, Neglected to post the data from my first check on April 4 - so here it is - 62 gourds with some nesting material and 10 empty. No eggs. Nest Check #2 - 12 April - 65 gourds with nesting material (53 were "strong" nests, the other 12 more like "under construction.&q...

Forgetful Fog here, Neglected to post the data from my first check on April 4 - so here it is - 62 gourds with some nesting material and 10 empty. No eggs. Nest Check #2 - 12 April - 65 gourds with nesting material (53 were "strong" nests, the other 12 more like "under construction.&q...

Hello everyone, My last post regarding nesting activity may have sounded pessimistic. All that changed this morning. The building frenzy is BACK ON. The residents exhausted a pine needle supply beneath a copse of three pines in my front yard by 9:30 this AM. I gathered a bucketful of needles from un...

Good Morning to all, My "first nest check" each season is triggered by the decreasing frenzy displayed during gathering nest material and nest building. It's like the girls say, "enough is enough. Time to lay eggs!" Last year my first nest check was March 24 and I counted 52 nest...

Are you sure this isn't Buddy's brother or maybe an offspring? No tag on Buddy, I have may doubts that this is the same bird. What say you.
Mike Fogarty, Palm City

Hello Everyone, Always exciting each season observing "events' as they occur in your colony - like first birds sighted, then a dozen, perhaps the first subbies, etc. An event I anticipate is "first birds to ground". I say this to myself with the thought in mind that this may be the on...

Wow! 53 years. Kudos to you. I'm only land lording since 2018 but the thrill of seeing your arrivals each year is always a joy.
Happy Martining, Mike

Hello to all, Again, in my chair in the afternoon watching my birds come to the colony after a day's hunt. Up to between 25-30 now and they are coming to the colony earlier: showing up now around 5:35 and entering the gourds around 5:50. The last two weeks they have been "going to bed" aro...

Rob, No, I have not tried supplemental feeding and don't plan to. This incident seems very remote and unexpected. Just one of those things. Weather today here in Palm City and most of south Florida is clear skies and temps approaching 75 degrees. Tomorrow in the low 80s. They'll be plenty of bugs (i...

Hello Everyone, From 2-3 at the first sighting, to 9 or so last week, I'm now up to 15-20 birds. They are all going into the gourds around 6:00 to 6:05. Not much vocalization. Walking my property over the weekend picking up pine cones and found 2 dead martins; one was decapitated and the other was t...

Hello everyone, Sat out tonight until it started to drizzle (About 5:45 PM). Counted martins coming in from the daily hunt. Last week I had 1-3 birds. Tonight, 9. Love to sit out and watch the colony as the season begins. Next week I bet I'll be seeing a couple of dozen. See ya later and Happy Marti...

To my responders, Thanks. Always great to witness our first arrivals, especially if you are a land lord and deal with the necessary weekly checks. You get to "know" your family. You miss them when they leave, wish them a safe journey and can't wait to see them again when they return from t...

Hello Everyone, My Martins are back. Had my first confirmable (bird watcher rules) sighting today. Stepped out of my house around 4:45 PM and saw 2 martins way up. One circled down and did a fly-by around my colony. He noticed the "Vacancy" sign and headed up high to his buddy. The vacancy...

Tom, Still no "positively confirmable (by bird watcher rules)" martins at nor above my colony here in Palm City, FL. Working on my Master degree in Wildlife Biology at LSU, I spent a lot of my misspent youth just south of you in the marsh east of Lake Calcasieu. This was back in the early ...

Hello to all,
Like Boston Blackie, I'm still searching and waiting to confirm the first martin over on perched on my colony. Had 41 degrees here this morn in Palm City, FL. Wow!

Happy Martining, Mike

Hello Everyone, Got all my landlord chores done with my 3 racks by the end of November; cleaned out of old nest material, washed and bleached, cables checked on the winches, etc. All 72 gourds were up, nice and pretty, and by early December, like the old Coasters hit of the late '50s - early '60s, I...

Hello to all, As suspected, when I dropped my racks (7/5/24), all young had taken flight! There were two youngsters hanging out in Lower 6 of Rack 2 but seems like they got the "urge" and took wing. So totals for this season are Rack 1 - 82 fledges, Rack2- 93 and Rack 3 - 75. Totals for th...

Hello to all, Dropped my racks 6/29/24 for check # 15. Rack l - no young and 82 have fledged from this rack, Rack 2 - 2 young in lower 6 and 91 fledges and Rack 3 - 0 young and 75 fledges. Thought this would be my last check of the season but 2 youngsters are still hanging on in Rack 2. Totals now a...