Purple Martin Forum

The link below provides some insight about the impacts of wildfire smoke on birds. Birds are less active during heavy smoke and probably bring less food to the nestlings. Body weight decreases and birds may suffer long term lung damage. Recommendation was to keep the birdbaths and feeders full durin...

Thanks for sharing the video. Visiting a roost is a great way to end the martin season! I plan to visit a couple here in Kentucky in early August.

Sorry for the sappy photo but I could not resist that rainbow framed behind the gourd rack. To balance it out, included is a normal photo of the gourd rack at the recycling center in town with Triplett Creek in the background.

Your set-up looks fantastic Steve. The birds will appreciate your effort once they find you. It is probably too late to attract a nesting pair this summer. However it is not too late for area birds to find your housing and potentially improve your chances next spring. Maybe leave the housing up unti...

John did you inspire anyone to pick up the obsession? Even one person who shows a genuine interest makes a presentation worth all the effort.

My experience has been the same as yours. Some years I will get lucky and one or two family groups will return to the gourds each evening for about a week or less. Then some years the birds just disappear after fledging. As far as where they go, I noticed one year a group of recent fledglings perche...

Congratulations to you and your son for attracting martins in the first year! That location looks about perfect for a nesting colony. The landscape is a nice mix of field and forest and of course the lake is a nice feature for the birds. Should be plenty of dragonflies to feast upon.

Thank you Dan for re-posting that story about the billion bug highway. That helps to explain how the largest known nesting colony of 1,000 plus purple martin pairs there in Alabama can find enough insects to feed their young.

Robert you have quite the challenge in front of you but it will be worth it when there are more martins in your gourds than house sparrows. I would tackle sparrow removal with three trapping techniques. Your ground trap is one method. Maybe try placing seed on the ground without the trap. Once the s...

I was able to view the housing on Monroe Street with Google Earth's street view. That median is very well maintained and beautiful as far as city streets go. The Jackson Audubon Society probably has members in Vicksburg, Mississippi. Maybe a couple of them would be willing to manage the housing.

This is not new because it was introduced to me a number of years ago here on the forum as an alternative to Sevin. Avian Insect Liquidator by VetaFarm is made for killing lice and mites on indoor caged birds. It can be sprayed directly onto indoor birds as well as onto their perches and nest boxes....

I would clean out the nests. If trapping and shooting prove to be difficult, you might have success forcing the starlings to abandon your site just with your presence. This practice worked again for me back in March here at my home colony where I am able to do it. A pair of starlings claimed one of ...

I believe "scout" reports are specific to active or established colonies based upon the instructions. However when a martin shows up at a new site and sticks, it would be important, when reporting, for the lucky new colony manager to answer the question about how many years their site has ...

I would shoot for the second week of April to install new housing at your latitude. Numbers of returning martins will have increased by then and the bulk of European starlings and English sparrows will have chosen nesting sites. You will still have to battle starlings, sparrows, and possibly tree sw...

The research is supposed to continue into 2026 so there should be a request for volunteers again soon. I wonder if Colby College will select a completely different group of volunteers for 2026 to include more of the martin's range? We should hear something in the next couple months.

The location looks great. I don't have experience with that brand and style of house. From limited observations here in Kentucky with that style of house, I see very few occupied by martins. I would add 4 natural gourds by hanging them from each corner of the house.

Difficult to know what might have caused them to leave. Maybe a tree has grown too close to your housing over the past 14 years. Can you attach a photo of your backyard with the housing in view?

For anyone in or near central Kentucky, this roost is still going strong on radar. The birds are roosting in a 7-acre woodlot adjacent to the Walgreens in Winchester. The Walgreens address is 2045 Bypass Road, Winchester, KY 40391. I visited on August 16. Upon arriving around 7:50 pm there were a fe...

A nice treat for sure to have that many martins visit in the evening. I heard some martins this morning high above the yard. I believe that my martins are part of a pre-migratory roost located about 46 miles to the west in Winchester, KY. Some birds will return in the mornings for a while. At my lat...

There is a roost located on the northeast side of Tulsa. A radar image from a couple days ago is attached.