5 Eggs No Nest

alfie · Sat May 14, 2022 6:01 am

Good Morning all - I had an ASY show up on 4/27/22 and he finally got a mate and they selected one of my Gourds a couple of weeks later. I did a few nest checks to see the status of what was going on and noticed they weren't building a nest. I didn't have the opportunity to do another check for a little over a week. When I finally did the check there were 5 eggs but no nest. I thought I might just put a nest in the gourd but I don't want to touch the eggs right now for fear of breaking them. So I figured I'd just wait a few days after the babies are born then take them out and put them on a nest. But I'm wondering since there isn't a nest and I put one in it what would the Martins do? Will they accept the babies on a nest or reject them? I do have a 1/4 x 1/4 wire mesh on the bottom of the gourd to keep the babies from slipping and ruining their legs. Just not sure what the Parents would do. Any suggestions? Thanks

dsonyay · Sat May 14, 2022 6:13 am

That’s weird. Maybe they’re minimalists. Could be an SY female maybe?

alfie · Sat May 14, 2022 6:19 am

They are both SY so maybe they didn’t know how to build a nest. I’m just wondering should I put one in after they hatch

SoIndyDon · Sat May 14, 2022 7:05 am

I've had SY females build a scant nest, but never no nest! Some SY will build a nest bowl/ nest ring with a bare bottom. I might suggest you put a little bit of white pine needles or dried grass straw circling the eggs. This will keep the eggs from rolling around in the windy conditions.

alfie · Sat May 14, 2022 7:16 am

Great idea I’ll do that

C.C.Martins · Sat May 14, 2022 8:40 am

Alfie,
Suggest you be careful with the amount you put in, one year a pair had almost no pretest material in a gourd they selected, so like an idiot decided to put some more in (should have waited for them to build), 1 hand full of pine needles. They abandoned, luckily they moved to the next gourd over. Suggest you pre nest, if you aren't already, sorry if you are. Iv got some females with thin nests now, eggs were resting on the plastic. I added just a bit between the eggs and gourd. Your predicament is a bit worse, you've got eggs in there.
Thats really strange, never know what you see until you look.

alfie · Sat May 14, 2022 11:50 am

I guess we’ll soon see. I put a little bit in. I can see somebody peeking out the gourd now. So hopefully that’s a good sign

C.C.Martins · Sat May 14, 2022 12:25 pm

Yep sure is! Good save, they do all sorts of strange things. Plastic is a terrible insulator. So are leaves, good gosh our birds brought in leaves. Tough to incubate and count eggs if they are buried. I dumped a bunch yesterday.

SueK · Fri May 20, 2022 12:03 pm

Interjecting here just to ask- I checked my 6 gourds and found various stages of build...it looks to me like their material of choice appears to be vines that they strip into thin pieces. Too large around to be thick straw stems, halved/ quartered short lengths - would share a pic but it says "file too large" (jpeg)- how to change here? Found 6 eggs in one gourd, still struggling to see in the other last one - all others empty yet. I pre-nested in the other housing (pine needles) and no takers - lots of tire kickers though, including TRES. Thanks.

SueK

alfie · Fri May 20, 2022 12:42 pm

Hi Sue - I guess I lucked out. Martins are still there. When I did another nest check some of the stuff I put in was moved around but not really where I think it should be. But hey it’s not my nest. If they are happy with it who am I to argue with them. When I do my nest replacement I’ll put a better nest in. I checked 3 days ago and still had 5 eggs, no babies. I’ll do another one Sunday or Monday depending on the rain we are supposed to get.