Dead Nestlings by the Handfuls

[Daryl Lindstrom - MN]

The last several days have been very cool a windy, with down-right cold night temperatures in the 40s. Before this cold snap it has been in the mid 90s. The martins have had a very tough time dealing with these weather extremes.

Today after work I stopped at my sister's place. She has one pair. Only two of the five nestlings were still alive. The living young were chilled and very weak.

I decided to head to the Rush Lake Colony to see how it was doing. Not good. I didn't even count the number of dead young. Somewhere around 25-30 dead young were found! I was carrying dead young out of the compartments by the handfuls. The nests were also CRAWLING with blowflies. I didn't have any nesting material to replace the nests, and I also didn't have much time.

I headed to the Plastech site. This site has two pair, one with nestlings and one with eggs. The nest with young had only one survivor out of five - I quickly replaced the nest.

I KNEW I HAD TROUBLE! I only had about two hours to change the nests in six sites!

I called by neighbor's who have two girls, 7th grade and 5th grade. I told them we had a series mission to accomplish.

I didn't have time to find dried pine needles. So, the two girls and I headed to Wal-Martin a picked up two big "bales" of pine shavings - it was the best we could do.

We were able to make it two five of the six colonies to remove dead young and replace the nests with pine shavings.

We worked like a well oiled machine.

At each site, I would run out and lower the housing while the girls hauled all the needed supplies. By the time the first house was lowered, all the supplies were ready. After a quick lesson, the girls knew what to do. At first they were very uneasy. After a few times of removing the live and dead young, they new that had a job to do. We each chose a section of the housing to work with and removed the young and the nest. Replaced the nest with fresh bedding and the placed the live young back into the compartments. Then, off to the next compartment. I checked the first few replacements the girls made... after that, they were on their own.

After the first house was done, we each did a quick check. All doors closed and hooked? Gourd caps on? Good. Up the house went.

As I raised the first housing, the girls hauled the supplies to the second pole. After I finished with the first house, I threw the winch handle towards the next pole and the girls began lower the gourd rack. By the time I made it to the gourd rack, the gourds were lowered and we went to work.

We replaced the nests at each colony in about 15 minutes. As we raised the housing, the martins were already returning with food to feed the young.

The young are weak, skinny, and chilled. In my opinion, the MASSIVE blowfly population in the nests with dead young would have quickly consumed the remaining live young.

We didn't have to to count the young. All we could do was pile them up and dispose of them in the weeds. I would estimate 50-60 young were lost. After I complete a nest check, I will have a much better idea - I'm not sure I want to know the real total, as the totals could easily be much higher. The nest replacements were the best we possibly could do.

We ended the frantic mission with an ice cream treat at the local Dairy Queen - after washing our hands of course!

We did your best, lets hope the martins try their darndest to fatten them young up tomorrow!

[Joe Zorn]

What an ordeal, Daryl!

Have you decided what caused the most deaths? The unexpected cold or the blowflys?

[Martin man RI]

Hi Daryl
The same thing is happening here in New England with temps well below
normal and rain daily. I have never seen weather like this. And this is
always the warmest time of the year! People that never lower there units
will wonder what happen to our Martins.
Ray

[Guest]

Another reason to do nest checks. This has been a terrible year for a lot of us. Let's hope and pray for a better year to come.

[Peggy Riley]

Sorry to see this Daryl. On the bright side it appears you've trained two new future landlords!

[Bernie Nikolai]

Very sorry to hear this Daryl...Blowflies in my opinion are a FAR more serious threat to martins in the north than we generally realize. There is a parasitical wasp in the south that lays eggs in blowfly larvae, so blowflies are not a problem in the south. This wasp apparently can't survive northern winters so they don't help us up here.

Other than complete nest changes there is only one thing that works on blowflies that I have tried. Dust the nest area with 1/2 teaspoon of Sevin just as the martin eggs are hatching (about 16 or so days from being laid), and again when the babies are 8-10 days old. Blowfly larvae go through three transformations, or "morphs" that take 2-5 days each. The last stage is the gross leathery bloodsucker creature we see that is 1/4 to 3/8" long. Sevin ONLY WORKS on the first 2 morphs. When they get to the leathery stage Sevin won't help. But this schedule works to prevent blowfly losses on martins up here in Alberta.

Some years blowflies are very bad and can virtually kill all the martin young in the north in various hard hit geographical pockets. Some years they barely exist. Its a mystery as to what makes the population explode some years.....However, since using the Sevin at martin egg hatching and again 8-10 days later, blowflies have stopped being a problem at my colonies. I'd say most years just a 1/2 teaspoon of Sevin at martin egg hatching time is all that is needed.

[Guest]

My martins here are also having trouble finding enough food for their young. Only been a couple days of cool and clouds and they are already in trouble. Found six on the ground today that are very thin,and weak.Trying to feed them today and will put them back tomorrow.Nest are free of parasites as I have used sevin under the nest. Maybe the heat followed by the cold has a lot to do with it?

[Dave Duit]

Being a landlord takes a certain person and you my friend did the best you could under the circumstances. It is so hard when a colony does bad. I feel for you.

[Gary W]

Hi Daryl,

I am very sorry to hear about this! We are fortunate in the south not to have blow fly infestations. I place a small amount of sevin under my pre-built nests before I raise the housing. That seems to be adequate for me to control mites, which are not as deadly as blow flies. I would think this kind of preparation would help protect your Martins next season! I wish you all the success in seeing your remaining young for this year fledge! Please let us know how things work out!

Gary

[Guest]

I don't think blow flies are the real problem here, even though they can be. I don't have blow flies. I'm in Northwest Ohio (Jenera) and I think it must be the extreme temperature changing going on. I did a nest change yesterday and noticed some very skinny and weak young. Today, I didn't see any adult birds at all out of the 7 pairs I had a few days ago. I had 33 young out of 7 nests yesterday. I fear the adults may have abandoned them? I'm not sure yet since I work a night shift and have very little time to watch them closely. I just got a call from a landlord from around Indian Lake, Ohio and he said his young birds are dieing also. He is trying to hand feed them as I write this. This has to be affecting just about every northern landlord.

[Guest]

We had three cold days here in Michigan this week. We have around
20 pairs of martins with young. On inspection today the whole colony but one nesting pair has all the young dead. I was surprise by this since the temperatures were in the high 50's low 60's during the day and mid 50's at night. Over half of the young had full feathers on them so I was surprised they did make either. This is the first time in our 12 year colony that something like this as happened, but this is the first time since 1992 that we have had temperatures this low in late June

[Guest]

Just got done going for a boat ride around the lake tonight to check out the other martin colonies. Hardly any of the colonies that once had martins a few days ago have them.

These last 4 days of cold, rainy, windy weather really did the martins in this year here in the Midwest.

[Guest]

I'm sorry to hear about that Nate! I just did a nest check a few hours ago and found 12 young dead out of a total of 33 in 7 nests. One of the nests had 5 young and they were all dead. I really hope I don't loose anymore. I have been a successful landlord for 6 years now and this really is terrible for everyone. I have been checking with other landlords around my area here in Ohio and they too are taking some big loses.

[Donnie Hurdt MN]

Daryl and others, after reading all the reports of all the doom and gloom on the dead and dying young I decided to do a quick nest check at my neighbors coloney that I am tking care of while he is in Iraq.
I am very happy to report that all is quite well there. The young are looking very healthy no runts and only one gourd had mites in it.
I have eight gourds there under his housing, he has two ten room wooden houses which are as far as I can tell are 100% occupied or nearly so.
From my eight gourds one has a nest built in it but no eggs all the others had five eggs laid and they all hatched except for one nest where only four hatched. Another gourd has 4 eggs that are to hatch yet.
I sprinkled seven powder in all the nests and checked out all the nestlings for problems and found none. All is well.
Hopefully it will stay that way untill they fledge, all the young look to be 8 to 15 days old.

[Guest]

That's great news Donnie! I'm a little confused why you weren't effected but I am very happy for you! All is much better today. I didn't have anymore deaths. Of course the temperatures are warming up a little more. I know for sure this is a weather related problem (no bugs) that affected many landlords. I contacted another landlord about 60 miles south of me and he too had some bad news. He has over 120 pairs and many young hatchlings. He said he hadn't looked through all of his nests but he thinks he might be over 100 dead young. Anyway, the adults have been feeding their young again since yesterday or the day before and it looks much, much better. If all goes well I should fledge 21 young out of the remaining 6 nests. On a side note, today I watched a pretty cool site in the sky and over our pond. The sky was full of recently hatched Barn Swallows, Tree Swallows and Martins. They were gliding all over the place and down to our pond. I was mesmerized by their gracefulness.

[Daryl Lindstrom - MN]

Thanks for the support!

After crunching some numbers, I am actually a bit relieved as there are still many eggs/nestlings that have a chance to make it towards fledging

For each site I calculated: 1) number of complete nest failures, 2) number of young lost, 3) nesting success (# of E or Y / # nesting attempts). When calculating nesting success, I include ALL nesting attempts, failed or not. I also calculated the nesting success before the inclement weather to show how the nesting success decreased after a few short days of hot weather (great for parasites) followed by a few days of rain/cool weather/wind (very few insects).

Here are the results:

Memory Lake
Total Nesting Attempts: 19
Nest Failures: 4
Young Lost: 28
Nesting Success before event: 4.63
Nesting Success after event: 2.53

Snake River
Total Nesting Attempts: 27
Nest Failures: 2
Young Lost: 17
Nesting Success before event: 4.78
Nesting Success after event: 3.56

Pokegama Lake
Total Nesting Attempts: 18
Nest Failures: 1
Young Lost: 14
Nesting Success before event: 4.72
Nesting Success after event: 3.78

ECE
Total Nesting Attempts: 25
Nest Failures: 1
Young Lost: 17
Nesting Success before event: 4.68
Nesting Success after event: 3.68

Rush Lake
Total Nesting Attempts: 31
Nest Failures: 4
Young Lost: 45
Nesting Success before event: 5.51
Nesting Success after event: 3.84

Plastech Corp.
Total Nesting Attempts: 2
Nest Failures: 1
Young Lost: 5
Nesting Success before event: 5.0
Nesting Success after event: 2.0

Total Nest Failures: 16
Total Young Lost: 126

Many young may have been lost; however, the current living young are now warm, dry, and generally parasite free. After quickly changing the nests, most of the weak nestlings pulled through!

I just wont reach the magic 4.0 fledges per nest this year; however, I'm still hoping to fledge an average of 3.5 young per nest!

[Fred Kaluza~MI]

Daryl... it's sad to hear these stories and there's nothing that can be done at this point except learn. Personally I don't have a colony but in the 9 years of trying I can tell you I NEVER had visitors this late in the breeding season until this year. Usually there is a major lull until fledging and wandering activity begins prior to migration in August. I never got the prolonged rain that others had "it must have been fairly localized" and the temps (nights) never got lower than the mid 50s and (days) seemed to have made it into the mid to uper 60s that I can recall These temps are apparently perfectly fine for adults in the Spring who are willing and able to scour a large hunting area and move to specific areas that provide what they need. Kind of like choosy shoppers with a bunch of coupons from 5 different stores, they know what's ripe at each place at each time. For raising young, the Martins probably know they have to limit their flying ranges so they forego variety and select places that have historically had peak quantity. Talk about putting all the eggs in one basket. The birds I had stop by in the last weeks of June may have detected a drying-up of food at their local colonies and having no young (as many young Martin pairs don't), were not tied down and either volunarily opted to "spread-out" or were urged to do so by other adults with babies to feed who did not have that option. Apparently there is a very close association in timing between when the young need the most food and the ability of local areas to provide it. I have often wondered about the ability for small lakes to provide what's needed while super-colonies grow along their shores. Lakeside Martin colonies in Michigan seem to have become a "last resort hold-out" when insect supplies have been depleted due to loss of bug-breeding habitat and pesticdes in the rest of the state but we see what happens when stocks run low. This appears to make the case for diversification just as with personal finances. When economic times get tough, you can see it's an easy lure to buy a lotto ticket or dump all your money into one fund that pays the highest dividend but it's strange to see other animals behave the same way (unless as I suspect they no longer have any choice in the matter). I truly feel bad for all the Martins that have been lost and their landlords as it makes the job wannabees face even harder but I'm anxious to hear more reports from neighboring areas like Ohio and Indiana which do not have so many lakes and must have a more diverse distribution of birds. I'm thinking the Wisconsin and Minnesota experiences will be much like MIchigan this eason. Bigger lakes on the otherhand would have been slower to warm anyway and so Martins near there would be used to getting Mayflies or MIdges and perhaps not rely so heavily on the marsh and wetland experiences of huge Dragonfly populations. Slow & steady wins the race...

[Guest]

RE: Midwest Martin Colony Losses

The more I think about this problem the more I believe that the adult martins have an instinctual trigger point where when food becomes scarce it causes them to abandon the babies. I base this on the experience my wife and I have caring for orphaned baby tree swallows and martins as well as several conversations I have had today with martin hosts.

Baby birds (including martins) have very large appetites and require sustenance constantly throughout the day to support their rapid growth and development. This high level of nutritional support would create a narrow window between being fed adequately and where rapid decline and/or starvation take place.

The adult birds themselves are reliant on large flying insects and their natural preservation instinct probably triggers them to abandon the nesting babies when food gets scarce. Once this trip point has been reached I doubt that the adults will return to feed the babies even if food again becomes available.

People I have spoken to tell me that the dead babies are ranging in age and don't appear emancipated or show signs of parasites, indicating that their death by starvation was quick. In most cases all babies in a nest were dead or near death, indicating that the entire nest has been abandoned.

Supplemental feeding would only be effective if it was consistently offered prior to the adults hitting the hunger trip point. If supplemental feeding is offered after the trip point has been reached I imagine that the adults will eat for themselves (if they find and know to consume the supplemental food) but that they will not attempt to provide it to the young they have recently abandoned.

A real challenge to martin colony hosts has to be determining if and when a nest has been abandoned. Clearly from reports from martin hosts there is not much time passed from a recent good inspection to the time that they discover dead babies. It is not possible for people to watch their martin houses all day every day to detect if abandonment has occurred.

In abandoned nests where some babies are found dead and some still alive their only chance for survival will be intervention by placing them into another nest or taking over care of them directly. Though placing the babies in another nest is often a very good solution, in this case placing them in another nest will probably only place further stress on the other babies and advance the hunger problem.

Direct supplemental feeding of abandoned babies will only be successful if the babies are constantly cared for from that point on. This is possible but not easy. You have to be prepared to care for the babies all day long since they require feeding every two hours (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuamY_cju8A ). The babies also require introduction to the outdoors and flying over a several week period (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSRox_2s ... re=related ) and re-introduced to other martins to fledge successfully. Again, lots and lots of time and attention are required to accomplish this, but it can be done.

Taking over the care of baby martins should be your last resort, but may become the only possible chance for their survival during this unusual year we are having. If you have a rehabilitator near you taking the babies to them could be your best choice. Regardless, good luck!

Jeff

[Peggy Riley]

Jeff, I agree with your post and have come to the same conclusion. I tried to supplemental feed several young that were about 20 days old without success. I have two nests left, one with one baby that is being fed by an SY female and another nest with two being feed by both parents. The two with both parents have always been healthly but the other 3 in the nest died. The last nest that fledged was 3 young out of 5 and they were very thin but were successful in fledging and are returning to the gourd at night. I've lost 25+ due to starvation from the heat. I would have lost many more but for the raccoon attack that took 43 babies that I can document.
This is indeed a very sad year for all of us.

Peggy

[Guest]

Peggy,

While different parts of the country are encountering different troubles, overall this is truly a sad year for purple martin enthusiasts everywhere. This set-back represented by the thousands of lost babies will negate much of the wonderful progress made by so many martin colony hosts over the past several years. Still, in nature everything is subject to the law of averages and the dedicated people at this site and others like are making positive advances over the long haul.

Losses of this type are very discouraging to people that have worked so hard to create a safe and secure site for their beloved martins. I have read in a number of forums where some martineers are talking about throwing in the towel, and who could blame them? To those people I would like to remind them that this devastating summer is the biggest single reason why their continued efforts and contributions are so vital to the recovery and success of purple martins.

This summer is a reminder of how cruel nature can be. Purple martins have already been threatened and stressed by competition from non-native birds and loss of natural habitat to the point that they are almost entirely dependent on man-provided housing to exist. Martin hosts are too important to the survival of purple martins to lose now. Please everybody remember your important roll in the big picture and for your martins sake keep your site open for business next spring.

Jeff