Major March Purple Martin Wave Roars In!

[Steve Kroenke]

Major March Purple Martin Wave Roars In!

In the last several days, including today many more purple martins arrived at our two personal colonies, mine and my neighbor Bob’s site. March is the main month for ASY martins to return to our colonies in northwest Louisiana.

It is impossible to count the number of martins but I believe I have between 150 and 200 martins in my colony at this time. All 17 of my housing systems, five Trendsetters and 12 gourd racks have martins in residence. Bob probably has well over 100 martins in.

Vicious fights are occurring between the newcomers and the present resident martins, many of which are trying to dominate multiple gourds or house compartments. This happens every season and there is NO brotherly love between male martins and NO sisterly love between females during the breeding time. Martins view each other as competitors for mates and territory though martins nest in colonies.

Migrant Accipiter hawks are already coming through earlier than usual and perhaps all the warm weather in February may have triggered the urge to head north. I have observed several attacks by sharp-shinned hawks and the victims were martin decoys on poles scattered near my colony; the real martins escaped! April is the most dangerous month for attacks by migrating Accipiter hawks and merlins.

Few starlings are showing up and my trapping system is catching them or I shoot any that stay around. We have a minor starling problem that is easily controlled through trapping and shooting.

We have almost NO house sparrows though an occasional male will arrive and he is promptly shot.

The most popular gourd in my martin colony is the Troyer Horizontal with either a tunnel/porch or a cling plate. These gourds are the first ones occupied by the earliest martins. However, my other gourd styles, Excluders, Super Gourds, and Troyer Verticals are now being occupied, too.

Steve

[LOUISIANA88]

Wow that is awesome! Send some of those martins to central LA... just starting up my site and hoping to get some to nest this year.

[Steve Kroenke]

Louisiana has traditionally had an abundant purple martin population. Martins are common in our area below Shreveport. We live closer to the small community of Longstreet but Logansport is the mailing address. So if your location is open and you keep other birds such as house sparrows and starlings out, then you probably have a good chance of attracting martins. Be sure to place some kind of predator guard on the pole as rat snakes are PLENTIFUL in Louisiana and these snakes can climb metal poles and destroy a martin colony. Good luck and please keep us posted on how things are going!

[LOUISIANA88]

Louisiana has traditionally had an abundant purple martin population. Martins are common in our area below Shreveport. We live closer to the small community of Longstreet but Logansport is the mailing address. So if your location is open and you keep other birds such as house sparrows and starlings out, then you probably have a good chance of attracting martins. Be sure to place some kind of predator guard on the pole as rat snakes are PLENTIFUL in Louisiana and these snakes can climb metal poles and destroy a martin colony. Good luck and please keep us posted on how things are going!

Thanks for the great advice. I've learned so much on this forum and the people are nice and helpful. Good point about the snakes... I need to get some sort of predator guard. I've seen some pictures that have been posted of some black wire (?) that look to be wrapped around the pole.. I'm not sure how to describe it... but looks interesting. I may have to make a shield of some sort.

I also read that adding a little pinestraw can help if you're trying to attract martins for the first time... so I added some to my setup today!

[taxidermy lady]

That black wire is bird netting! You can find it just about any box store! Make it fluffy and attach it with zip ties! The snake gets caught in it and you have to dispose of the snake! Good luck with that! There's instructions somewhere on this site about how to do it! Good luck with getting martins!