My Trendsetters have been cleaned and one is lowered and another is raised to invite starlings to check in but not check out alive! In our area of northwest Louisiana, starlings often start checking out possible nesting cavities in the fall and early winter. In fact I saw several starlings in their winter plumage including a singing male over at my neighbor Bob’s martin colony the morning of November 5, 2019. I usually begin my “early starling trapping program” around the first of November and catch some prior to the arrival of the martins. The raised Trendsetter has three PMCA Trendsetter traps inside and the other rooms are closed off. I have placed PMCA metal traps in Bob’s three Goliads, raised them, and have the “welcome sign” out for any starlings! We don’t have much of a starling problem and so far I have been able to easily control them via trapping/shooting.
I did have four Trendsetters for the 2019 nesting but have replaced two of them with new 24 gourd Super Systems for the 2020 martin season; there are 48 new Troyer Horizontals with tunnels/porches to hang on the racks. The Trendsetter is my favorite aluminum martin house but I must confess I like gourds the best. I plan to eventually replace my remaining two Trendsetters with gourds in the future.
Here are two photos showing the contrast between my colony with everything there and most everything gone! One photo shows my entire martin colony in late July of 2019. Most the martins have finished nesting. The other photo shows my colony with all the gourds removed and one Trendsetter lowered and the other one raised to catch any starlings. If you look closely at the photos you can see the two Trendsetters which were replaced with the new gourd racks. I still need to add the winches to the poles and net traps.
