perches

[barbiejoe]

After 3 years of use, my front porches are getting brittle and breaking off. I am wondering. Has anyone ever tried inserting dowels into the two holes that attach the porches? The birds could land and perch on them.
I tried this spring, hanging some of my gourds without porches, and the martins seem to have a hard time getting into the half-circle door.
The remaining porches had a crack between the porch and the gourd. I lost a martin last year whose foot got caught in the crack. I have put caulk in the crack, and some of the caulk has already detached from the gourd. We just put the caulk on 2 weeks ago. Because of the poor performance of the caulk/porches, I don't particularly want to buy new porches that will act the same as my present porches are acting. Grump grump!!
Any easy remedies appreciated!! Barbiejoe

[-=DKC=-]

You didn't say what kind of gourds you are using, but I find that the S&K plastic porches don't last more than one season. They're cheap though so replacing yearly wouldn't be too expensive.

The porches on the S&K tunnels last a long time. I've had mine for at least 6 years and they're still going strong with no brittleness. In fact I switched all of my porches for tunnels this year. The tunnels make a safer cavity for the birds anyway.

[MorganW_AL]

I am on my second season of Bo 9 gourds. When I put them up this year I noticed one of the porches that was just struggling to stay on. I shored it up for the time being, and it has held on. Oddly, my first pair that showed up this year chose that gourd first. Lol

[-=DKC=-]

After 3 years of use, my front porches are getting brittle and breaking off. I am wondering. Has anyone ever tried inserting dowels into the two holes that attach the porches? The birds could land and perch on them.
I tried this spring, hanging some of my gourds without porches, and the martins seem to have a hard time getting into the half-circle door.
The remaining porches had a crack between the porch and the gourd. I lost a martin last year whose foot got caught in the crack. I have put caulk in the crack, and some of the caulk has already detached from the gourd. We just put the caulk on 2 weeks ago. Because of the poor performance of the caulk/porches, I don't particularly want to buy new porches that will act the same as my present porches are acting. Grump grump!!
Any easy remedies appreciated!! Barbiejoe

Hi barbiejoe-

3P-top.png (44.38 KiB) Viewed 4782 times

If these are the porches you are using I have 8 that will never use. I'll send them to you gratis if you private message or email me your mailing address. 4 are new and 4 are used. I think I might be able to scrounge up enough attachment snaps for them as well.

I also see that S&K has an updated version of the porch with extra supports underneath. Maybe the plastic will hold up better on the new ones. You might try using Lexel to caulk/glue the porches on along with the pins. That's how I attached my tunnels this year.

As far as using dowels, there's only one way to find out. Since they would be on either side of the entrance rather than directly below the entrance, I'm not sure they would help the birds wiggle inside. But it doesn't hurt to experiment.

[-=DKC=-]

I am on my second season of Bo 9 gourds. When I put them up this year I noticed one of the porches that was just struggling to stay on. I shored it up for the time being, and it has held on. Oddly, my first pair that showed up this year chose that gourd first. Lol

I think the attachment pins start to pull out with daily use and abuse. New pins seem to help tighten them up for a new season.

[jpp77]

I have Bo11 gourds with tunnels. I ordered some of the alternative porches from their site when I purchased these gourds and I'm on season 3 with no issues whatsoever.

[John & Linda - KY]

I'm afraid dowels would give the starlings enough leg room to be more able to breach the crescent entries, the height of the porch is very important. -- John