High wind

[Trosl1]

At what wind speed to you lower your Martin houses. How low to lower the house

[C.C.Martins]

Guess it depends on your pole type and house. And your comfort level.
Its always windy in corpus, and I rarely raise them all the way up.
Keeps me from raising and lowering all the time.

I will lower at 45mph gusts and over, half way even a bit lower if necessary. Martins do not miss a beat.

Hope this helps.

[flyin-lowe]

Let us know what type of housing you have as well as the poles. I have 2 T 14's that are on 4 1/2 inch round steel poles. I could leave them up year round and they won't budge. I have two AAA gourd racks on 2 inch square aluminum poles and if there are gusts over 30 MPH I'll lower them a few feet. If it is calling for more than that I'll go a little lower.

[brent]

I have 16’ poles and keep the houses 2 feet lower because the weather can change instantly. I will lower them an additional 2’ if extreme winds are predicted and they are for tonight and tomorrow. See photos. Might go an additional foot just in case. Brent

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[Dave Reynolds]

,, I lower mine if the wind gust get up in the 30 MPH range,, I lower them as low as I can,, Sometimes only 4 feet from the ground…. Good Luck…

Dave

[brent]

Really Dave? That low? I was always afraid to lower them lower than what I stated but with extreme winds possible tomorrow I might lower them a lot more. Thanks for the information. I’d hate for the houses to be blown down. Brent

[Thomas Maddox]

Brent, I never lower mine. Last Spring we had a few days of 60+ gusts and a few other days of sustained 30 mph winds without issue. Now this is with a 3" square aluminum pole. I added a 2" square aluminum pole this year, but it just has 8 gourds on it. During hurricane Laura, back when I had only an S&K house, I left it up(I was really a poor landlord back then.lol). We had sustained winds of 160+ and it was fine(the house was at its highest level). Honestly though, I think I'm going to quit chancing it. It doesn't take long to lower them and the PMs don't really mind for more than a couple of minutes.

[flyin-lowe]

TrosI, you may or may not know this but once you have martins at your site you don't want to lower the housing after dark. Get them down during the daylight hours or leave them up and hope for the best.

[Phil01]

I keep mine a couple feet down all season. When wind is gonna be sustained above 30 or severe thunderstorms are predicted I’ll lower them halfway.. The Martins don’t care. I really should just leave them halfway, but they look sooooo cool raised… lol
Phil

[Thomabear]

I got tired of raising and lowering and really couldn’t be around 24/7 to monitor weather since I have racks at my home and camp that’s about 3-1/2 hours away. Now I just leave both down a couple of feet, leaving the lower entrances at 10 feet and the upper entrances at 14 feet. My The setups are Troyer K24 and K19 gourd racks with all chirpynests installed on both. Both poles are 3 inches in diameter and cemented in 24 inches with 3-60 pound bags of concrete each. They both experience the occasional high winds and haven’t budged. Both units are fully occupied and the birds don’t mind a bit.

[Martintown33]

Agree, martins don’t mind if you lower.. I usually go to about 10 to 9 feet in high winds.. it does depend on your pole strength, top weight, and how you have it cemented into the ground..
Rob