Did the bad weather ruin my season?
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flyin-lowe
- Posts: 3789
- Joined: Wed Mar 29, 2006 8:49 am
- Location: Indiana/Henry Co.
As you know here in IN we have had some horrible weather the past few days. Thurs. it rolled in and I was reading on here about how to prepare and some feeding methods. My PM's left Thurs. morning and I have not seen them since. I don't think they are coming back at night. I know some people have said that they will weather the storm away from there housing but will they leave for several days? Yesterday I saw one PM circling my house but I don't think it was one of mine because it acted liked it couldn't or didn't want to go into the gourds. When I did a nest check Thur. morning there were two nest that looked almost complete. Cool temps, lots of rain, and 60 mph wind gusts I am just hoping that they will return but I have a bad feeling that they will not. Any advise from anyone who has seen this type of trend before.
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Mary Dawnsong
- Posts: 1685
- Joined: Wed Nov 12, 2003 8:17 pm
- Location: Michigan, Livingston County
Hi,
During long, springtime no-hunting spells, martin landlords have reported that their martins disappeared for days, then returned with the good weather.
The assumption is that they go to a larger colony -or- a site with warmer housing and participate in communal cavity roosting. For more info on this survival technique, click on:
http://www.purplemartin.org/forumarchiv ... vRoost.htm
(Note that the above paper "guesses" that the bad weather conditions happen about once every 10-20 years. That's sadly wrong! The northern midwest has had those conditions almost every spring from 2002-2006.)
If most of your martins survive this very bad no-hunting weather, they will very likely return to you. If most die, then you may not see them.
In May 2002, a similar but more widespread no-hunting period killed countless martins. For that story read the PMCA Update article:
http://purplemartin.org/update/Suppleme ... g11(3).pdf
In May 2003, a New Jersey landlord saved most of his colony after he noticed they were starving in similar weather:
http://purplemartin.org/update/12(3)NJSupFeed.pdf
Landlords can feed their martins and save their lives. These papers tell you how:
http://purplemartin.org/downloads/FeedingArticle.pdf
http://purplemartin.org/update/14.3-Sup ... eeding.pdf
Good luck to you and your birds,
Mary
During long, springtime no-hunting spells, martin landlords have reported that their martins disappeared for days, then returned with the good weather.
The assumption is that they go to a larger colony -or- a site with warmer housing and participate in communal cavity roosting. For more info on this survival technique, click on:
http://www.purplemartin.org/forumarchiv ... vRoost.htm
(Note that the above paper "guesses" that the bad weather conditions happen about once every 10-20 years. That's sadly wrong! The northern midwest has had those conditions almost every spring from 2002-2006.)
If most of your martins survive this very bad no-hunting weather, they will very likely return to you. If most die, then you may not see them.
In May 2002, a similar but more widespread no-hunting period killed countless martins. For that story read the PMCA Update article:
http://purplemartin.org/update/Suppleme ... g11(3).pdf
In May 2003, a New Jersey landlord saved most of his colony after he noticed they were starving in similar weather:
http://purplemartin.org/update/12(3)NJSupFeed.pdf
Landlords can feed their martins and save their lives. These papers tell you how:
http://purplemartin.org/downloads/FeedingArticle.pdf
http://purplemartin.org/update/14.3-Sup ... eeding.pdf
Good luck to you and your birds,
Mary
Click here to see my colony
"In Michigan every martin matters"
"In Michigan every martin matters"
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CUL Lou~Mich
I just got home from going to check a colony that I know of. It's pretty small. Only two pair seen today. However, they are out flying, and sitting on the housing preening, which I doubt they would be doing if they were in danger of starving. Today it's BARELY 50 degrees, but no wind whatsoever. It's also intermittent drizzle. All four birds (2 ASY males, 2 ASY females (very dark bellies) all looked to be in fine shape. None of them were sitting around drooping their wings or anything. They all looked pretty good considering they were soaking wet. CUL Lou
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flyin-lowe
- Posts: 3789
- Joined: Wed Mar 29, 2006 8:49 am
- Location: Indiana/Henry Co.
Still not looking good. I have only seen two PM's since last Thurs. Yesterday I saw the second one flying around for about two minutes. It did enter one of the gourds for about 1 minute and then left. I have a bad feeling that they have taken off for some reason. It finally stopped raining here yesterday afternoon for a few hours. That was a 7 day stretch of CONTINUES rain. I was out and saw a lot of PM's flying around so I not the birds survived the rain but they have left my site.