I already have a coates watershed 4 with w/2 horizontal gourds underneath. One ASY male staying in gourd.
I have ordered a natureline pole and three natureline gourds that will be coming in any day now.
Is it alright to add extra housing at anytime? Or should I wait till I have some PM's nesting in my present housing?
Adding housing, ANYTIME?
Oh, gee, I forgot to ask, how far apart should I place the housing and poles? I also bought a bed and breakfast feeder tray with four trays. Any suggestions on how to place that?
"Look at the birds in the sky. They do not sow or reap, yet your heavenly Father feeds them."
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Emil Pampell-Tx
- Posts: 6743
- Joined: Tue Nov 11, 2003 1:26 pm
- Location: Tx, Richmond (SW of Houston)
- Martin Colony History: First started in Gretna, La in 1969 with a small homemade house, have had martins ever since at 2 different homes in Texas
Its OK to put up housing anytime, but if you put it up too late, you may not get any martins to occupy it.
The distance apart is really a personal choice, as there are many different opinions so here are mine:
1) leave enough room so that you can work on the housing without any bumping into the other housing
2)leave enough room to get the mowers between the poles.
3)put your housing so that they have an open flyway toward the most open area..martins can land coming nearly straight down, but they are like a jet fighter, they need a long open flyway to take off so that hawks cannot catch them before they reach top speed.
4)I personally like to have the gourd racks so that the outer most gourds on two different racks are no closer than 4ft. Or houses are no closer than 4 to 6 ft from each other.
5)put them in a very open area
I would put the bed and breakfast about 20ft from the poles, but nearly any distance is OK..I have mine about 40ft away at the end of the garden. I put it there so that I would not need to mow or trim around the pole.
The distance apart is really a personal choice, as there are many different opinions so here are mine:
1) leave enough room so that you can work on the housing without any bumping into the other housing
2)leave enough room to get the mowers between the poles.
3)put your housing so that they have an open flyway toward the most open area..martins can land coming nearly straight down, but they are like a jet fighter, they need a long open flyway to take off so that hawks cannot catch them before they reach top speed.
4)I personally like to have the gourd racks so that the outer most gourds on two different racks are no closer than 4ft. Or houses are no closer than 4 to 6 ft from each other.
5)put them in a very open area
I would put the bed and breakfast about 20ft from the poles, but nearly any distance is OK..I have mine about 40ft away at the end of the garden. I put it there so that I would not need to mow or trim around the pole.
PMCA Member, 250 gourds, 6 poles, 2traps