need help quick
i have an asy pair nesting in a 12 compartment house i have up. on 4/21 they laid their first egg. when i did a nest check a hosp had begun to build a nest on top of the martin nest with the egg in it. i think that this same pair built a complete nest in the compartment next door. when i checked today there were four eggs in the compartment next door and still one egg in the original nest. after cleaning the hosp nest out they did not come back. do i need to move the one egg to the compartment next door or is it too late?
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CUL Lou~Mich
Evan337. I'd say at three or four days of the female not attending to the egg, it's probably not viable any more. They have to be turned every so often, or the embryo sticks to the eggshell, and won't develope correctly. Hope you got rid of the EHS. CUL Lou
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Dale Hrncirik
Evan
IMHO, you need to shoot or trap that HS 1st and see which nest the martins choose. If they go back to the new nest with one egg, you could move the other 4(IFF you are sure they belong to the same ASY female and IFF she doesn't lay anymore) to the newer nest with one egg. Chances are the martins abandoned the first nesting attempt and possibly the 2nd one. good luck,
Folks, here's a prime example of what is likely to occur if you choose to allow HOSP to 'occupy' some of the cavities.... NOT COOL
Dale
IMHO, you need to shoot or trap that HS 1st and see which nest the martins choose. If they go back to the new nest with one egg, you could move the other 4(IFF you are sure they belong to the same ASY female and IFF she doesn't lay anymore) to the newer nest with one egg. Chances are the martins abandoned the first nesting attempt and possibly the 2nd one. good luck,
Folks, here's a prime example of what is likely to occur if you choose to allow HOSP to 'occupy' some of the cavities.... NOT COOL
Dale
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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
I agree with Dale, your most important task is to get rid of the sparrow, or keep it away. The martins are better caretakers of the eggs than us humans are, so the best procedure is for you to take care of the sparrows, and let the martins take care of the eggs. I hope it all works out well for you...good luck with the sparrows..
i think i am going to have to buy a trap b/c i have shot and killed 6 male hosp this spring but this pair has been very elusive. they are no longer trying to nest in this house. every sparrow i see i try to shoot and kill. i am certainly not passive in regards to starlings or sparrows. one thing that has made this year more difficult but in a good way is that i have 9 nests going in and b/t 20 and 22 martins on my t-14 and my twelve compartment house. this takes the 12 gauge shotgun out of play which had been my weapon of choice for hosp or starlings. i apologize if i seem like a negligent or apathetic land lord. i have tried very hard to do things right to help my martins. in this case these hosp have been very good at not letting me get a clear shot with my benjamin pellet gun.
dale the hosp are no longer in either of teh two nests. i think the asy pair just moved to the compartment next door. the hosp are gone and there is one egg in the original nest and four in the nest next door. sorry if i did not make that clear. what i think happened is the martins laid their first egg and when the hosp built on top they moved next door. i cleaned the hosp nest out as soon as i saw it but apparently the martins decided to lay the next 4 eggs in the other nest.
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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
It is a constant battle to keep away the starlings & sparrows everywhere, but I think they are much worse in wood houses than they would be in gourds. A very good choice is to try to find an old Trio house, and put some traps into them. Remove the Trio door, and replace it with a trap door...That is a very effective way to trap the sparrows. You may ask around for one, sometimes poeple will give them to you.
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Dale Hrncirik
Evan,
I wasn't speaking directly at you when making my final point...I was referring to the countless many landlords that put up with a few sparrows in their martin housing.
Just try your best to trap the HOSP. It is often easy once they have a full blown nest because you can use a glue trap or mouse trap inside the little hole. Just ripping out their nest is a very bad idea because that only angers the HOSP into taking revenge against the martins, their eggs/young.
In the meantime, you might want to check your housing every day for HOSP nest cuz they can build em that quickly...that is, until you get control of them.
What kind of house is it? If it's a Trio, get a sparrow-door and you can trap the HOSP in no time. Good luck,
Dale
I wasn't speaking directly at you when making my final point...I was referring to the countless many landlords that put up with a few sparrows in their martin housing.
Just try your best to trap the HOSP. It is often easy once they have a full blown nest because you can use a glue trap or mouse trap inside the little hole. Just ripping out their nest is a very bad idea because that only angers the HOSP into taking revenge against the martins, their eggs/young.
In the meantime, you might want to check your housing every day for HOSP nest cuz they can build em that quickly...that is, until you get control of them.
What kind of house is it? If it's a Trio, get a sparrow-door and you can trap the HOSP in no time. Good luck,
Dale
after further observation, the female is incubating the four eggs and the asy male has been in the compartment with the one egg. will male martins incubate eggs? again if the martins have not given up on this one egg i would be willing to move the one with the four to consolidate the nests to make their job easier. again any advice is welcome. this is only my third year to have housing up and only my second to have martins. in 04 i had two pair, last year i had none and this year there has been an explosion in the number of birds i have. so managing this many nests is a whole new experience.
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Louise Chambers
- Site Admin
- Posts: 6208
- Joined: Tue Nov 04, 2003 1:07 pm
- Location: Corpus Christi, TX
Evan, the male can't incubate the egg, he lacks a brood patch. Go ahead and move the solo egg next door - they do not start incubation until the next to last egg is laid, so perhaps this egg will still be viable. you might make a very light mark on the egg with a pencil so you can ID it later on. Hatching can be spread over 3 days, so don't discard any eggs prematurely - very rarely, incubation can be interrupted for a few days without harm. this usually happens during bad weather. good luck and let us know what happens -
Louise
Louise
thanks for all the help/advice. i moved the egg so now there are five in one nest. i watched the female incubate them this morning. i am a big fan of glue traps now. i bought one this morning and put it in the compartment of the t-14 that the hosp moved to and within an hour i caught and killed the male hosp. i am sure there will be more b/c every male hosp i kill within a few days another one arrives but now i have a quick easy way of capturing these pests.as of today 13 bb have fledged from three nests with the second nesting attempts about to begin. there are two chickadee nests one with five eggs and one with five babies and i have 13 martin eggs in three nests and four more nest being built or just finished so it has been a great year so far. hoping to fledge 30 martins and 30 bb's in my third year.