Reporting Losses

[cary-nw-fla]

Forum Admin: Question/Suggestion: Given the wide spread extent and devastation of this weather event, has any consideration been given to creating a reporting mechanism for landlords to report related male and female deaths to study the impact on martin numbers this and next season? Thanks.

Reporting:

As of today after preforming a ground and complete nest check my losses are:
8 Males and 12 Females.

[brent]

My losses were 6 males and 1 female. Ground and nest checks.
Brent

[DLN]

Hi Cary, I am sorry that I am not the forum admin and I am very sorry for the loss of your martins. I have one 12-room martin house directly on the beach in Mary Esther south of your location. My outcome from this weather event is completely opposite yours and, as a retired meteorologist and research analyst, I am intrigued by this difference. Do you know what your low and high temperatures were each day for the roughly 9-day event? If not, I can look them up. Here on the coast, we were at least 10F degrees warmer than the inland locations and probably more based on your outcome. The number of cloudy days and rainy days should be the same as for my location since our two locations are much closer than the scale of the weather systems that rolled through here. The next question I have for you is what type of housing do you have? Both size of compartments and material it's fabricated with. If you have varied housing, were you able to log number of dead martins per type of housing unit? Could you break it down to males versus females per type of housing unit? Could you log what direction the opening of the housing was facing for the units with dead martins in them? Did you put any pre-nest material in the housing units that contained the dead martins and what was that material? Did you attempt any artificial heating of the cavities? Did you attempt supplemental feeding, if yes, was it successful at any point? If you can answer these questions, it may provide some anecdotal evidence that could be used in the future to try and prevent another mass casualty event for you. Of course we won't have enough data to statistically prove anything did or didn't exacerbate the naturally bad situation but any indicator that might help in the future I think would be welcomed. My results were 30-35 martins took refuge in my 12-room, octagonal, wood house for 9 days and they are still here tonight huddling together in compartments. Most of them are not my martins. I pre-nested with slash pine straw cut into smaller pieces. Cavity sizes are 6"x6"x7". Was only slightly below freezing for 2 to 3 nights , coldest temp was 27F. With about 6 1/2 days of cloudy, rainy, foggy weather, the martins were able to feed on their own at some point each day. I did not provide artificial heat and did not supplemental feed. While they were able to survive on their own, they were looking very tired with drooping wings this past Thursday and Friday morning but the sun came out Friday afternoon and they perked right up. Sorry for the long post but wanted to reach out and help if I can. Best of luck to you for the remainder of the season.

DLN

[cary-nw-fla]

HI DLN. In answer to some of your questions. Housing is all gourds. Big Bo's, BO9's, BO11's, Troyer Horizontals, Troyer Verticals, & Super Gourds. Gourds are 4 or 8 to the pole at about 14 ft high and are equally faced to North, South, East, & West. All were pre-nested with pine straw. The temps: Feb 16th. @ 9am 25deg with wind chill of 17-19deg. / Feb17th. @9am was 31deg (probably colder earlier) / 18th, didn't get temps, but low and I don't believe the PMs were able to feed / 19th 27deg.... Daily highs I believe were upper 30s to low 40s (didn't record them). Too many gourds to try to do hand warmers. (I have close to 100 gourds up right now, with more to be raised later). No supplemental feeding, except for two from the ground that I tried to feed crickets, but could not save. Did not record which type gourd or the way they were facing with regard to finding the dead PMs.
The fact that you have the wooden house and the difference of our temps with me being more inland I think is a big factor.
The day before the cold came in I counted 42+ martins on site, don't know what the numbers are like now as I haven't been able to get any reasonable count.
Thank you for your interest and hope I was able to answer most of your questions.

[DLN]

Hi Carry, thanks for the additional information! I will try and pull the temperature data tonight or tomorrow but, based on what you reported, I don't think our temperature differentials are going to be a great as I expected. The meteorological data will certainly tell us for sure. I think the biggest factor in this event was the health and wellness of each bird upon their arrival to our sites. We don't know it and we can't control it. My birds were 15 days earlier than ever before! I did not have my house out--had to run and put it out. What drove them to leave the Amazon so early? Were conditions bad down there such that they arrived weaker than usual and then got hit with more harsh conditions to contend with? Some birds will die because it was their natural time to die. Some, who are older and weaker, will die from the added stress of having to try and keep warm while having to burn more energy looking for scarce food and suboptimal food. I agree housing material would be one factor to explore. Plywood is a good insulator and has an R value of about 1 (I think) but plastic is also a good insulator because we use it to make ice chests and coolers out of so it has some amount of insulation quality. Now plastic is not breathable but wood is. Wood will absorb moisture and dry out but plastic won't. Heat coming off the birds, huddling in a wood cavity, should not cool and condense on the walls but it will on the plastic gourd interior. The more moisture/condensation inside the cavity, the harder it is to raise the internal temperature to a survivable level. I speculate the bigger factor between my house and your gourds is cavity size. The total area that the birds needed to heat with their own bodies was far greater in the gourds than in the house irrespective of the materials used. The smaller cavities means...say 4 birds...can spend less energy each while collectively keeping the temperature at a survivable level. The large gourds may work great in the heat of summer to cool the birds but, in the cold of winter I think they might be too large to over come the heating deficit. It's all speculative because we don't have the money or resources to test the factors. I will try and post the temperature differentials by tomorrow. Thanks again for the information!

DLN

[brent]

Very interesting. What about the Trendsetter houses. Aluminum with insulation on ceilings of each compartment?
Brent

[DLN]

Hi Brent, aluminum is a good conductor of heat (and cold--think frosty beverage in a can) but a poor insulator for the most part. Insulation in the attic of an aluminum house would definitely help but if the walls and floor aren't insulated the outside air temperature quickly becomes the inside air temperature. Pine straw on the floors would provide an insulative layer between the birds and the cold aluminum. If I had an aluminum house at my location, given my weather conditions, I would have tried to wrap the entire house less the openings with some type of insulative product the same way we southerners often have to wrap our exposed pipes to keep them from freezing.

DLN

[flyin-lowe]

I don't think temps in the high teens to low 20's alone is enough to kill them. I also understand the temps at the coast being different than in land. It seems odd that the subtle difference in the air temps would be the difference in them surviving or not. It seems both would have access to the same food supply, you guys are close enough that the martins a few miles in land would travel to an area where the temps are warmer, given the proximity, to find food.

[Conrad Baker]

I lost 2 males, one female. All three were in the same compartment. However, I have not seen ANY of my birds yesterday, this morning, or this evening. I had about 18 total in my three S&K houses. Now NONE. I don't know what to think. They usually are flying high above the housing, and I can hear them when I go out to check on the houses. Not today.......Nothing. I'm really concerned they are all dead somewhere.

[brent]

Conrad, I hope that's not the case. I lost 7 that I found either in houses or on the ground. The remaining birds leave late morning and come in right at dark. Maybe they're still around. I'm hoping the best.
Brent

[Conrad Baker]

Conrad, I hope that's not the case. I lost 7 that I found either in houses or on the ground. The remaining birds leave late morning and come in right at dark. Maybe they're still around. I'm hoping the best.
Brent

Me too Brent. I don't think the Martin population can afford to lose as many as I have suffered (near 100%). It's not just our area, this cold weather pattern was across the entire Nation for the most part, so I think every landlord was affected.

[alfie]

I am really sorry to hear about all the loses. I am trying to become a landlord but it looks like it might not be possible this year. I am wondering about the ASY's. I read they usually show up 4-6 weeks after the Scouts. Does anybody think they were affected by this winter storm?

[Conrad Baker]

I am really sorry to hear about all the loses. I am trying to become a landlord but it looks like it might not be possible this year. I am wondering about the ASY's. I read they usually show up 4-6 weeks after the Scouts. Does anybody think they were affected by this winter storm?

Don't know for sure (who does?). They usually migrate later in the year, so they might find warmer weather when they arrive. I sure hope so. That is the only hope for my Colony this year since my first group of arrivals are dead.