HOW CLOSE IS CLOSE
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Guest
We are still, in the trying mode. We have two active colonies within a ten mile radius. How close is close, for neighboring colonies? We have not confirmed a single Martin visiting as, of this date, at our site. The migration into or through our area will continue, for another month. The population is perceived, to be small, in our area. One reason....few are trying, to properly host the bird.
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Mary Dawnsong
- Posts: 1685
- Joined: Wed Nov 12, 2003 8:17 pm
- Location: Michigan, Livingston County
Hi,
I'm not aware of a criterion for "close". Even martin colonies 10 miles or farther apart may have regular contact with each other. In some areas, martins are known to fly many miles daily to reach an ideal hunting spot. This is especially true early in the season when flying insect supply may be unreliable at their colony site and they have no eggs/young to tend. A single hunting spot may attract martins from a wide radius, exposing many martins from many distant colonies to each other.
You're playing the dawnsong, right? Best way to draw martins into a site that is off the beaten path.
Are you aware of the Purple Martin Preservation Alliance?
It is a Pennsylvania organization and they have a website.
They seem to focus on southwestern PA, but may have knowledge of colonies in your area.
Scroll down their homepage to find lots of interesting stuff:
http://purple-martin.org/
Good luck, Mary
I'm not aware of a criterion for "close". Even martin colonies 10 miles or farther apart may have regular contact with each other. In some areas, martins are known to fly many miles daily to reach an ideal hunting spot. This is especially true early in the season when flying insect supply may be unreliable at their colony site and they have no eggs/young to tend. A single hunting spot may attract martins from a wide radius, exposing many martins from many distant colonies to each other.
You're playing the dawnsong, right? Best way to draw martins into a site that is off the beaten path.
Are you aware of the Purple Martin Preservation Alliance?
It is a Pennsylvania organization and they have a website.
They seem to focus on southwestern PA, but may have knowledge of colonies in your area.
Scroll down their homepage to find lots of interesting stuff:
http://purple-martin.org/
Good luck, Mary
Click here to see my colony
"In Michigan every martin matters"
"In Michigan every martin matters"
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Guest
Mary...........Thank you for all of your comments. I went to that site to confirm, from another source, that we are doing as well as can be expected. Like every other newbe or wanna be we would like it all yesterday...........but alas we must be patient and wait our turn.
As of this moment we are all closed up again hoping, to retrain the Tree Swallows, back into their original first choice provided other housing. The Sparrows are getting as much attention as we are able to provide. We are on site most hours of most days awaiting the precise moment, to reopen our site. If we made any mistake it was that we opened our site to soon and gave the competition an opportunity, to move in. This time we will not give them another chance until the Martins are in and settled.
As of this moment we are all closed up again hoping, to retrain the Tree Swallows, back into their original first choice provided other housing. The Sparrows are getting as much attention as we are able to provide. We are on site most hours of most days awaiting the precise moment, to reopen our site. If we made any mistake it was that we opened our site to soon and gave the competition an opportunity, to move in. This time we will not give them another chance until the Martins are in and settled.
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Mary Dawnsong
- Posts: 1685
- Joined: Wed Nov 12, 2003 8:17 pm
- Location: Michigan, Livingston County
Below is a forum post from June 2002 written by a man in New York state who attracted martins to an area with very low population density. I saved the post because I found it inspirational. I've changed his name to just initials.
Kingston , NY Mid-Hudson Valley
I really consider myself lucky, since this is a very martin-sparse area. The only colony I know of in my entire area is 10 miles away. I?ve never ever seen a martin here , in many years of avid birding. So all I can say is that all the techniques of attraction that I learned from the PMCA and many other fine individuals who so willingly give their time and advice on this forum have really paid off, and I thank all of you for that !
I have a T-14 with a mix of crescents and a few r.h. shallow compartments. Underneath I have a r.h. supergourd, an r.h. natural ( which they chose ), and two porched , crescented natural horizontal gourds. I?ve been playing very loud dawnsong from a powerhorn on the T-14, which is powered by a loop cassette and amplifier. So I firmly believe that this is what got them here. I also followed the suggestions in Ken Kostka?s ? Social Attraction? article in the Archives, and made false nests with pine needles, smeared mud, used decoys, and mirrors. All of these combined must have convinced this pair to stay!
The T-14 is actually my ?secondary site? about 700 feet from my house near a small pond, and near a farm shed. The ?primary site? is a gourd rack, with a mixture of r.h. SuperGourds, r.h. natural gourds, and porched, crescented, natural horizontal gourds. I played mostly Daytime Chatter at this site, and the martins looked both sites over carefully, but settled for the one farther from my house, probably because this is where I was consistently playing loud dawnsong, and probably where they were first attracted, I don?t know. Both are very open areas.
I also should mention that I followed Dan Drew?s tree swallow / bluebird protocol, and at both sites have nesting tree swallows and bluebirds at 30 ft. from the martin house. I had no interference from either, so thanks Dan, without your advice I probably would not have martins, as I have very heavy tree swallow and bluebird populations in my immediate area. Your protocol really worked perfectly for me!
So thanks again to all the many who gave advice and support. And to the beginners struggling like myself, don?t give up! It?s worth all the ups and downs, and if you keep at it you will be successful. If I can do it in this part of NY, I?m sure it can be done most anywhere. So keep trying, the rewards of seeing your first birds are tremendous ! best of luck to all, P.C.
Click here to see my colony
"In Michigan every martin matters"
"In Michigan every martin matters"
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Guest
I get mixed messages, on the playing of Dawnsong. The instructions indicate it should be played about two or three hours from early morning darkness into a half hour or so, of daybreak. We are delivering it loud out over open space between my site and the river flats. We are up on a hill side so the air space is clear, for miles about 300 degrees of the circle. I rotate the pole on which the horn is mounted. Therefor the message is falling within a substantial spread of degrees. The remaining degrees are mixed with large trees but there are openings into a half mile, of open space, in all but one direction. No large trees are within a hundred feet anywhere in the 360 degrees. We play Dawnsong beginning at 4 AM until 7AM. It mingles with the natural song bird dawnsongs.
We are led to believe the subbies are just approaching our area from the Southeastern coastlines. This shows nicely, on the Scout Report map. The migration appears to follow the river valley patterns with the Mississippi Ohio being the strongest route. The Delaware and the Susquehanna also being lesser flyways. Within a week or two and for as much as a month the subbie movement should be checking us out.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
I can play Dawnsong manually at other hours, if there is any indication that it would attract and not confuse the overflying birds.
We are led to believe the subbies are just approaching our area from the Southeastern coastlines. This shows nicely, on the Scout Report map. The migration appears to follow the river valley patterns with the Mississippi Ohio being the strongest route. The Delaware and the Susquehanna also being lesser flyways. Within a week or two and for as much as a month the subbie movement should be checking us out.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
I can play Dawnsong manually at other hours, if there is any indication that it would attract and not confuse the overflying birds.-
Mary Dawnsong
- Posts: 1685
- Joined: Wed Nov 12, 2003 8:17 pm
- Location: Michigan, Livingston County
I have no doubt that the different opinions you get on attraction, housing, etc. can be very confusing. The problem is that there are no hard and fast rules. Different martins behave differently. Martins in one part of the country may behave differently than martins in another area.
About housing...
The Winter 2006 PMCA Update magazine has a great article written by Joyce Holton of Landenberg, PA. She has tried for years to start a colony using a variety of housing and has had nesting martins in only 2 different seasons, 2001 and 2005. So, Joyce has started her colony twice!
In 2001, Joyce attracted one pair to a round hole SuperGourd hanging under a wooden house. (She forced the pair into a crescent SuperGourd after they were committed).
In 2005, Joyce attracted two pairs, but the females refused the gourds and chose a Trio house with crescent entries. (However, the birds couldn't enter the crescents. So she changed the entries to round hole until they were committed, then switched to excluders.)
Given her experience, I doubt that Joyce would generalize that one type of housing is more attractive to martins than another. Joyce's strategy was to offer as many different types of housing and entries as possible and let the individual birds choose what they want. It sounds like that's your strategy, too!
Joyce concluded that you have to observe your martin visitors and be prepared to make changes and break the "rules" to convince them to stay.
By the way, that PMCA Update magazine is available as a reprint. It's the last one on this page, issue 15(1):
http://shop.purplemartin.org/shopsite/p ... ssues.html
Now about the dawnsong....
Without the dawnsong there is only one way martins can find your site - they must fly almost directly over and see it. That's not a problem at all if you live in an area with lots of martins flying around. However, you live in north central PA which is an area with a very low population of martins. Realize that many folks who post on this forum live in areas that have 20, 50, even 100 times more martins breeding in their area than you do.
Click on Relative Abundance of Purple Martins, North American Breeding Bird Survey:
http://www.mbr-pwrc.usgs.gov/bbs/htm03/ ... a06110.htm
So what are the odds of martins seeing your housing when there are so few martins around?
When you play the dawnsong, you give martins a second and very powerful way to find your site - they hear it when they fly within hearing range.
If I were in your situation, I would be doing everything possible to advertise my site. I would play the dawnsong and/or daytime chatter loudly most of the time. You can't "confuse" martins who haven't found your site.
Once martins do start finding your site, then it might make sense to change your strategy and restrict the hours you play the dawnsong. If you get regular visitors, you may want to turn it off altogether. In my 9 years of participating on this forum I must have read hundreds of posts regarding success/failure using dawnsong. Those experiences and opinions are all over the map. Some have said the secret to success is to play it loudly 24 hours a day all season long, the other extreme warns you that it scares martins and attracts hawks. They may both be right - what keeps one martin hanging around might drive another away. You have to figure out what works best for your situation. As Joyce from PA learned, watch your martin visitors and make changes to suit them.
Good luck, Mary
About housing...
The Winter 2006 PMCA Update magazine has a great article written by Joyce Holton of Landenberg, PA. She has tried for years to start a colony using a variety of housing and has had nesting martins in only 2 different seasons, 2001 and 2005. So, Joyce has started her colony twice!
In 2001, Joyce attracted one pair to a round hole SuperGourd hanging under a wooden house. (She forced the pair into a crescent SuperGourd after they were committed).
In 2005, Joyce attracted two pairs, but the females refused the gourds and chose a Trio house with crescent entries. (However, the birds couldn't enter the crescents. So she changed the entries to round hole until they were committed, then switched to excluders.)
Given her experience, I doubt that Joyce would generalize that one type of housing is more attractive to martins than another. Joyce's strategy was to offer as many different types of housing and entries as possible and let the individual birds choose what they want. It sounds like that's your strategy, too!
Joyce concluded that you have to observe your martin visitors and be prepared to make changes and break the "rules" to convince them to stay.
By the way, that PMCA Update magazine is available as a reprint. It's the last one on this page, issue 15(1):
http://shop.purplemartin.org/shopsite/p ... ssues.html
Now about the dawnsong....
Without the dawnsong there is only one way martins can find your site - they must fly almost directly over and see it. That's not a problem at all if you live in an area with lots of martins flying around. However, you live in north central PA which is an area with a very low population of martins. Realize that many folks who post on this forum live in areas that have 20, 50, even 100 times more martins breeding in their area than you do.
Click on Relative Abundance of Purple Martins, North American Breeding Bird Survey:
http://www.mbr-pwrc.usgs.gov/bbs/htm03/ ... a06110.htm
So what are the odds of martins seeing your housing when there are so few martins around?
When you play the dawnsong, you give martins a second and very powerful way to find your site - they hear it when they fly within hearing range.
If I were in your situation, I would be doing everything possible to advertise my site. I would play the dawnsong and/or daytime chatter loudly most of the time. You can't "confuse" martins who haven't found your site.
Once martins do start finding your site, then it might make sense to change your strategy and restrict the hours you play the dawnsong. If you get regular visitors, you may want to turn it off altogether. In my 9 years of participating on this forum I must have read hundreds of posts regarding success/failure using dawnsong. Those experiences and opinions are all over the map. Some have said the secret to success is to play it loudly 24 hours a day all season long, the other extreme warns you that it scares martins and attracts hawks. They may both be right - what keeps one martin hanging around might drive another away. You have to figure out what works best for your situation. As Joyce from PA learned, watch your martin visitors and make changes to suit them.
Good luck, Mary
Click here to see my colony
"In Michigan every martin matters"
"In Michigan every martin matters"
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yvesquad
Hy All,
Mary!,
Many TNX for all of your good help and your important info........
You are such an help !!!!!!
Yves
Mary!,
Many TNX for all of your good help and your important info........
You are such an help !!!!!!
Yves
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Guest
I was concerned about hawks and owls when playing Dawnsong. I can now say, to this point, in an area with lots, of hawks and owls, I have yet, to see, any evidence that they're attracted, by Dawnsong played, the morning hours. One reason may be that they cleaned up the first hatch, of rabbits, plus most, of the chippies and mice. Early this spring it was showtime as they worked the neighborhood. I now see them working the river flats. The pickings there must be better at this time. The only critters attracted may have been a Canadian Crow. It sat by the decoy and speaker horn a day or two. It too found better eating elsewhere.
We have the second hatch of squirrels. The crows are enjoying the chase but the owls and hawks have ample pickings by the river flats. Nothing hurts the squirrel population much. They are just good looking rats that people feed, in darn near every back yard, in our community.
OK.........I shall turn Dawnsong loose, for more hours. I may come up with neighbor problems. We shall soon find out.
All of you who have responded, to my chatter, are sincerely appreciated. It sure helps during the waiting periods. We are aware that our population is less rather than more. In addition when you speak I am sure others are being helped too.
Someday if you should be nuts enough, to want, to grow a big pumpkin I can sure enough help those growing less than a thousand pounds. Yep that can get a little crazy just like wishing, for these dog gone birds, to show. The pumpkin, of this year's dreams is in the cold frame and doing well. If we should get the Martins it will be a banner year in the Gipe backyard.
We have the second hatch of squirrels. The crows are enjoying the chase but the owls and hawks have ample pickings by the river flats. Nothing hurts the squirrel population much. They are just good looking rats that people feed, in darn near every back yard, in our community.
OK.........I shall turn Dawnsong loose, for more hours. I may come up with neighbor problems. We shall soon find out.
All of you who have responded, to my chatter, are sincerely appreciated. It sure helps during the waiting periods. We are aware that our population is less rather than more. In addition when you speak I am sure others are being helped too.
Someday if you should be nuts enough, to want, to grow a big pumpkin I can sure enough help those growing less than a thousand pounds. Yep that can get a little crazy just like wishing, for these dog gone birds, to show. The pumpkin, of this year's dreams is in the cold frame and doing well. If we should get the Martins it will be a banner year in the Gipe backyard.