is it a bad year for subbies?

[tboydshirt]

just wondering from longtime members, is this an unusually low turnout year for subadults? as I watched this year in the scout arrival study, the adult population grows to nearly 3000 sightings, but even a month later the subadult spottings barely crack 300. was it this way in past years, or has a weather phenomenon harmed a lot of the late arrivals?
i'm a wannabee first year in the forum. doing everything I can think of to attract them but only visitors so far.

[BIOteacher012]

Hi tboydshirt,
You ask a very good question. I have an established colony of close to 40 pair in Wisconsin. What I am noticing is that 95% of my current numbers are mostly ASY birds. I have maybe 1-2 SY males so far and possibly a handful of SY females.....mostly paired with ASY males. In my colony, there has not been the usual wave of SY birds that fill in the gaps for me, at least so far. I am hoping that more come through our area. I was going to post a question on this myself, so I am glad that you are asking everyone. Not sure what to make of it other than a cool June last year in the upper midwest and lots of hatchlings that died as a result. I had a good hatch and fledge rate despite poor feeding months last year. I was hoping to see more of my SY birds floating around. Maybe they are just running behind this year. I am sure others will have additional information to help answer!! Good luck and please keep us posted on your progress this season.

[4th Gen Martin Fan]

tboydshirt,
What a great question! Like Brian T, I am wondering about the SYs this year.
Your setup sounds excellent with lots of room available for a great colony. I count 84 open compartments in your setup! That is a lot of work and expense. It would be nice to hear that a large wave of SYs are coming your way and you will have an awesome colony.
Is your setup situated in an open area with no encroaching large trees? It would be great to see pictures of your setup on the Forum.

[randyM]

Similar situation in north-central South Dakota. I have not had a SY male show up yet. I've had 3 ASY pairs for the past 3 weeks, had 3 more ASY males show up in the past 2 weeks. I have had 3 SY females show up and join the 3 unpaired ASY males within the past week, but that's the only subbie activity I've seen at my colony. We've had good south winds from Texas to Canada more days than not in the past week to 10 days, but not much for new arrivals at my place. Hopefully they are just a bit behind schedule and will be arriving in bunches soon.

[avesrun]

Yes good question . I too thus far seem to be experiencing a lower level of Sy migration up to this point than usual. However, I'm also not seeing the numbers of barn swallows and other migrants that normally would be present. So therefore I'm hopeful that things are just running a little later than usual. Only time will tell. For those still trying to start a colony, I can only recall a post from Louise Chambers on this Forumm several years ago where she stated do not give up an ounce of Hope until June 1st! (Not a direct quote but hopefully close and accurate enough!)
TimG

[4th Gen Martin Fan]

Randy,
I searched Google Map and found Long Lake, SD and matched a blue dot on the Scout-Arrival Study that should be your colony.
I admire your colony at the edge of purple martin colonization. How did the purple martin find your colony? Are there other purple martin colonies in your community/area? Were there martin landlords in the area that are gone now? Are you reestablishing martins in an area once prolific with martins?
Your colony should be an inspiration to those martin landlords trying to establish new colonies and especially colonies at the edge of martin territory.

[rcwisk]

Hello,

This is Randy up in West Bend, WI. Up until a couple of days ago I had 40+ pairs of ASY's but yesterday and today the SY's are pouring in. Not sure if they will all stay but I would say I have approximately 25+ subbies here. A little later this year but they are on there way....

[Daryl Lindstrom - MN]

Last year I had 41 nesting pairs in my yard in the east-central region of Minnesota. Currently, it seems I have more birds than last year at this time... mostly adult birds. This evening I noticed many subadults scoping out the colony. The were especially entertaining to watch as they scrambled to find an open compartment they were comfortable with. I watched on my deck until nearly dark and some of them were still flying circles, deciding where they would be confident enough to chose a compartment to sleep in for the night. What a noisy crazy scene they sure do make! This is the first large bunch of subadults I've seen this year. They are on their way! Subadult migration in Minnesota continues well into June.

[Wildriver]

Last year I had 41 nesting pairs in my yard in the east-central region of Minnesota. Currently, it seems I have more birds than last year at this time... mostly adult birds. This evening I noticed many subadults scoping out the colony. The were especially entertaining to watch as they scrambled to find an open compartment they were comfortable with. I watched on my deck until nearly dark and some of them were still flying circles, deciding where they would be confident enough to chose a compartment to sleep in for the night. What a noisy crazy scene they sure do make! This is the first large bunch of subadults I've seen this year. They are on their way! Subadult migration in Minnesota continues well into June.

Hi Daryl
That is sure good news about the sub adults. Trying to get a colony started in Minneapolis next to Cedar Lake. Put up two nice T-14 houses and have only had a couple of older birds looking over new houses. The location we selected is extreamly visible to all the neighbors and is creating a “buzz” about the PM. Hoping to break in on the Minneapolis Chain of Lakes and return this bird to our city. I have never managed a community house before. Now we just need that first pair!
I am spoiled in that my Wisconsin colony was instant success

[randyM]

Mark,

Thanks for your interest in my colony and local situation.....I'll answer your questions with perhaps more detail than you bargained for There are very few martin colonies in this part of SD. It is very rural here with a few small towns (population < 500 people) widely scattered about every 25-30 miles or so. I know of 5 martin colonies "near" my home: a colony 25 miles north of me (~20 pairs), a colony 25 miles west of me (~15 pairs), a colony 45 miles SE of me (~30 pairs), a colony 45 miles SW of me (~40 pairs) and a colony 50 miles east of me (~80 pairs). Most of these colonies are in small towns. Most of the area farms don't have bird houses, and the few that do, have them too close to trees and are overrun with house sparrows/starlings. Most of the farmers have cattle and feed grain, thus attracting large numbers of sparrows and starlings to their yards. The few farmers with bird houses that I've visited with said they are too busy to control sparrows and starlings. There is good martin habitat here in eastern SD - lots of shallow wetlands and scattered lakes surrounded by native prairie grasslands (and cropland). Given the human population is low here (and declining), that equates to limited interested martin landlords, thus a limited martin population. Many of the larger communities in SD have small backyard martin colonies, but these "larger" communities are few and far between, especially the further north and west you travel in SD. I grew up in Bismarck, ND and our neighbors had a small martin colony and I always thought they were cool birds. I tried to get a martin colony started at my current rural SD location for quite a while, with limited luck. I got a bit discouraged over the years waiting for martins to nest, so I turned my interest to tree swallows. I put up over 100 swallow/bluebird houses/gourds 4 years ago. I currently have over 60 TS pairs with eggs. I have a very large martin housing spread (10 homemade wooden houses, each with 4 stories and 20 total nesting cavities and four 24 count gourd racks with varying styles of gourds), totaling 300 nesting options for martins. I figure if I have to short-stop migrating martins that have their sights set on areas with higher martin densities, I have to provide a wide array of nesting cavities to entice those that stop by to stay and nest instead of continuing their journey further north. As you can tell, I don't do anything at a small scale, good, bad, or otherwise . I'm looking forward to the day when I have more nesting martins than nesting tree swallows (hopefully within the next 3-4 years). I had a new ASY male arrive this afternoon, followed this evening by a SY female that joined him in his newly selected compartment for the night (that's 7 pairs now - all with ASY males). I think the SY female may have been hatched at my site last year as I believe I saw a shinny reflection of a band on her right leg. I did not get a good look at her to see if she had a yellow band on her left leg. I'll check tomorrow if she hangs around. A fellow SD martin landlord with a banding permit banded all 16 young the fledged from my colony last year....I hope a few more return. The three ASY females at my site are well into nest building now and two of the SY females just started. That's all for now.

[4th Gen Martin Fan]

Randy,
That is just the kind of report I was hoping for!
A great story of dedication and persistence that is paying off. You have even investigated the surrounding area to determine the closest martin colonies to you.
Your site is a good example of restoring martin territory that would be lost if martins are not provided housing. I hope your report is an encouragement for new landlords including dedicated landlords who have been working at restoring martins in their area for a long time (Example: Ryan of Eganville, Ontario, Canada).

I am sure that at this point you have read that SY martins are swarming through the country headed north. Look out for these late arrival SYs.
There is no vacancies in the colonies I mentor. They are full of ASY pairs busy laying and incubating eggs for next year's SYs. This year's SYs need to head north to establish new colonies.

[Ryan]

It was eerily similar to my story, from the closest current colonies,, to the past old colonies now gone, to the tree swallows in large numbers. Very similar. Thanks for sharing in detail, it gives hope.


Encouraging for sure, however the toughest part of my quest I really think is being at the north end of migration. I simply don't have any martins going further north to established colonies like everyone else reading this probably has. I wish I had good numbers flying past me, it would be easier to at least see some fly around the housing even if they don't stay. I usually see one martin every four years for a brief few minutes. This is year 4 since I've seen the last one so hoping to at least see and hear one for a few minutes this season.

That's how low my expectations have become lol.

[4th Gen Martin Fan]

Ryan,
Your mantra will be "Go North, Young Martins!"
I understand your situation better when you explain that your colony is at the northern range in Ontario. If the martins were traveling further north of you, then they would see your colony.
My hope is that the martins were established in your area at one time but declining numbers of landlords made the martin population sparse again.
How is the old colony doing that had a dilapidated house and you added a new, modern martin house?

[Ryan]

He only had about 6 ASY birds back a week ago. Hope he gets more as his numbers have been in a free fall and at these current numbers he'll be close to getting wiped out in a season or two.

[4th Gen Martin Fan]

Ryan,
How far away and in which direction is his colony from your home colony?
I had always hoped that his numbers would increase and help jump start your colony and the satellite colonies that you help manage.

[Ryan]

About 25 miles NorthEast.

Every colony is East of me and far. This is a really good site for people trying to track down local colonies. https://ebird.org/map/purmar?neg=true&e ... &yr=last10

You can click on "all years" and see the siting to my north and west that has all but disappeared.

[4th Gen Martin Fan]

Ryan,
There is a big difference between Past 10 Years and All Years.
It looks like Campbell's Bay is the primary focus of purple martin colonies Northwest of your colony in Eganville. Is Campbell's Bay where the colony you helped?

Was it glacial actions that produced the low lands that Eganville topographically lies within? Or was it the Ottawa River that created a river like basin?

I ask because Eganville does not appear to have mountainous terrain on the topographic map.

[Ryan]

Yes all of the points marked around Campbell's bay are from the colony that I now have housing at. The ebird points are sometimes sloppy. It's a very nice area on a large island. There may be one more old colony there as there are some older marks from sighting from about 10 years ago, but I did not find it when travelling. I imagine that site is no longer.

I'm in a pretty good spot with those 5 lakes that you can see about 15 minute drive away in all directions. This was a rich Martin location 30-40 years back but with lack of quality housing up keep i believe they vanished with some other issues that we all know about and struggle with.

Lots of farm field around me between those two mountain ridges that you mentioned.

[BrianV]

West Bend is a little north of where I'm at so this answers my question of they younger martins arrival. This is my first year with a house and while I have seen up to four martins flying over my property, none of them seemed to take interest in the martin house. The ones I have seen seemed like adults and probably aren't looking for a new home.

Anyway, can someone answer a question for me? I see "SY" and "ASY" and other abbreviations. Can someone tell me what these letters stand for?

Thanks

[4th Gen Martin Fan]

Brian,
SY means "second year". The adolescent martins who fledged last year and made the trip once to and from South America. Also called subbies or Sub Adult. Adolescent plumage.
ASY means "after second year". The adult martins who have made the trip at least twice to and from South America. Adult plumage.
HOSP means English House Sparrow.
ES means European Starling.
S&S means Sparrows and Starlings.
SREH means Starling Resistant Entrance Hole.
TS means Tree Swallow.
BB means Bluebird.
PM means Purple Martin.