This is my first year trying to attract martins. I have had several PMs come to my house & I think I have a pair nest building. Several of you have suggested variety in housing, so I added 2 man-made gourds under my house. The first day they were there I had several martins investigate, but they seemed to have a difficult time landing on the SREH. I have read the differing opinions on porches, but since that first day I have not seen any birds investigating the gourds. Would porches help in this incident?
Thanks
Gourd Question
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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
There really is no answer, because we don't know what the martins that show up at your place like. The female chooses the cavity, so you know how females are!
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Guest
Rolo27; I use the 10" Super Gourd and Troyer Horizontal Gourds. Both have crescent openings and only the Horizontal has porches. The PM's can and do cling to the Super Gourd and enter with no problem. The horizontals don't offer enough area for their tail feathers to help push them up and into these gourds, so I use porches. My aluminum housing has excluder entrances with double sized compartments. If your other housing still has round holes for entrances the PM's will probably prefer these easier compartments to enter and only look at the gourds.