At my second year colony, as of March 29, 2006 I now have close to 90 ASY pairs in residence with many ASY males still trying to secure territory. I have now exceeded my total of 81 pairs of martins that colonized my site in 2005. Bob probably has over 100 pairs now. So we have close to 200 pairs of martins at our colonies. All appear to be ASYs. The sky will be filled with martins when all are flying about.
Each evening numerous migrants appear to arrive and try to secure a place to roost. I believe many of these martins are on their way north to Arkansas and farther north. However, that said, it appears ASY males will sometimes stay and try to fight their way into our colonies.
The main competition problem has been with dominant males controlling multiple cavities, including both house compartments and gourds. It is really bad at times and I would already have over 100 pairs of martins if the possessive males would relent. This nest domination behavior will weaken after the females finally select their nest site among several they may control.
In several situations at my colony, one female martin ?controls? two males. I have seen this happen every year and always results from a dominant pair controlling multiple cavities until another single male manages to secure territory in their territory. So the female will often continue to control the territory between the two males. It gets complicated and frustrating for the males which constantly pursue her and sometimes fight with each other. She will often sleep with one and then immediately in the morning visits the other male to make sure no other female is inside. Eventually she will settle down with one partner, but it can take weeks of this ?confused? behavior. She will chase other females away until one of these females is match for her or she simply ?gives it up? and stays with one of the males.
I also have two males functioning as ?bigamists? and I have also seen this rare behavior in the past at my Tallahassee colony. In these cases, the male may eventually ?give it up? if another equally strong male will move in and try to claim one of the females. However, the males don?t always give up their additional female and will sometimes have two mates which will lay eggs and produce young. I had one bigamist male in Tallahassee that actually raised both his mates? young and was a good father.
Dawn singing by the males has not commenced and should any morning now. The first SY males typically show up about this time with most arriving in April.
My Troyer horizontal gourds are proving to be extremely attractive to martins and so are my natural gourds that maximize vertical/horizontal depth. All my vertically deep woodpecker gourds are now occupied.
Starlings and house sparrows continue to be non-existent at our personal colonies. I shot one flying male starling about four weeks ago and that has been it. Just no problems with starlings and sparrows so far.
At one of our satellite martin colonies located at Longstreet, Louisiana, I saw a male Cooper?s hawk ?stalking? it and the martins were screaming and circling the tree where I saw him land. This colony has been experiencing ?hawk fright? behavior over the past week or so and some martins may have been predated.
It looks like we will have two super martin colonies side by side this year in northwest Louisiana! I don?t know what the final totals will be per colony, but I suspect we will both have close to 150 pairs of martins a piece. It is a martin ?madhouse? around here!
I have included a panoramic photo of my martin colony. Bob's colony is in the background. I wish there was more room for a larger photo to more clearly depict the housing and martins.
Steve
