Nest Check in Northwest Pennsylvania

[bwenger]

Martins in northwest Pa started laying eggs a couple of days earlier than last year, which surprised us all due to the cold winter and the late spring that we had.

My prior nest check was on May 22nd, when I had 54 nests with 255 eggs.

I completed another nest check today and now have 66 nests and 349 eggs at 7 different locations. I have some T14 cavities and gourds closed at most of these sites, to push birds elsewhere to start new colonies. A total of 37 cavities are closed off.

1) Pymatuning Learning Center
23 nests with 120 eggs.

2) PGC Wildlife Management Building,
13 nests with 75 eggs.

3) PGC Swamp Road location,
8 nests with 35 eggs

4) St. Philips Church,
4 nests with 24 eggs.

5) Linesville Spillway
5 nests with 23 eggs

6) Linesville Fish Hatchery
8 nests with 47 eggs

7) Espyville Marina
5 nests with 25 eggs

Total cavities open is 99, total cavities closed off is 37, for a total of 136 gourds and T14 cavities.

One thing that I wanted to make note of, and I feel that this is significant, since T14's have appeared to be the housing of choice up here in northwest PA, but at the Pymatuning Learning Center, with a 24 gourd rack(18 available gourds) and a T14 with 10 available cavities, not a single active nest was found in the T14, whereas 15 of 18 available gourds had active nests with eggs, and the other 3 gourds under the T14 had nests with green leaves in them. Only one of the T14 cavities had a nest with green leaves. They are preferring the gourds this year!

Also, I have nine 7 egg nests at this time, more than I have ever had.

Have a great Martin year.

Bill

[Dan G]

Sounds great Bill. I was reading your post and my wife calls from upstairs and tells me to look at my bird house. There was a martin sitting next two the two decoys!!!!!!!!!!!! I took some pictures and am pretty sure it was an SY male. I only saw one and he was checking out a couple cavities on the T14. Stuck his head in but didnt go in. My wife said when she first saw them, there were two but one flew away. How am i supposed to be productive at work today.

[Doug Martin - PA]

Bill, Great job up in NW PA.

Here in Fombell They have always preferred gourds.

I am full to the brim here this year. It appears to be an outstanding number of returning birds.

Good year to start a colony for sure.

Dan, We are rooting for you there. Fingers are crossed. If you believe.... pray a lot. It worked for me. lol

[taxidermy lady]

Dan it is hard to work and watch martins! But I have been doing it! It's pretty tough having a martin house outside your window where you work! I am very lucky!

Good luck with getting started!

[wastrox]

Bill, I'm a newbie and I just took on two public sites on golf courses. I'm interested in your experience with public sites. How did you end up with so many? Are there others working with you?

[avesrun]

Outstanding is all I can say! First thing I noticed were the sites averaging more than 5 eggs per nest! I had it in my head that 5 eggs was the max so your post educated me and causes me to keep reviewing my Martin biology! Great to see so many public sites that makes for enjoyment and exposure to many people from all over the planet! Great job!
TimG

[wastrox]

Bill, I'm a newbie and I just took on two public sites on golf courses. I'm interested in your experience with public sites. How did you end up with so many? Are there others working with you?

[bwenger]

Thanks everyone for your thoughts.

Dan, I hope you start seeing more birds here in the next couple of days. I am hearing reports of SY martins showing up in more numbers recently. I have had a SY male here at my personal colony since Saturday and he has yet to find a female that will stay with him. Hopefully he finds one soon, since it is hard to get stuff done when you hear him making a lot of noise as he tries to bring a female down from the sky.

Doug, thanks for your words. We all know how everyone has struggled over the years to get martins in western PA, but thanks to all of the longtime landlords, the martin numbers and number of sites are climbing fast.

Brenda, I started volunteering in 2008 at two PA Game Commission sites, and just started adding colonies as the years went on. It has been a lot of work, but it also was a way of trying to fledge more martins to start new colonies across the area, including my own personal colony. I'll include my email address below and we can share some information. In 2009, several of us started the Lakeland Area Purple Martin Association, and the number of colonies and fledged birds are rising yearly.

Tim, two of these sites were started in 1999, so they are some of the oldest around. Those older birds tend to have higher egg counts. After Hurricane Agnes went through PA in 1972, it took 27 years to get purple martins back at these prime locations. The lake is 73 miles around its shoreline, so it's a great place to host martins! This has been a good year so far with the number of eggs laid. Hopefully the weather continues to be favorable and this could turn out to really be a year to remember!

Hope everyone has a great year!

Bill
[email protected]

[ToyinPA]

Bill:

You've worked hard & it has paid off. Great job .

Toy in PA

[bwenger]

I did another nest check today since I'll be gone for a couple of days and found it was hatching day for some young in a gourd at the Pymatuning Learning Center. Three of the 6 eggs had hatched earlier today.

Egg laying seems like it just started, now we have the hatching beginning. It is going to be difficult here in about 3-4 weeks when a lot of these birds will be getting close to fledging and the SY nests will have eggs, and/or young only a week or two old. Nest replacements will be difficult at that time.

Bill