Housing type:
Self made Troyer T-14 (14 compartments with 4 additional hanging "Super-gourds"). Note: nest checks are done every 5 days until end of season. To see live pictures of the T-14 and martins click here
Arrival date April 20, 2003
4/20- Weather was very cool with temperatures in the freezing range at night. The house was lowered 3 ft (from 19' to 16' off the ground) and the pole reinforced to eliminate a bad bow due to the strong and regular winds we get here in Iowa.
5/15- Martins are starting to couple and nests are being built. Sparrows are being controlled by the martins. I have to remove a sparrow nest about once per week, sometimes with eggs in it. Otherwise, the sparrows are not a problem.
5/30- To date, there are now 10 pairs of martins working on building nests. Gourd 4 and Boxes 2, 6, 8 have green leaves and there are partial nests in Boxes 4, 9, 10, 12, 13 and 14.
6/4- My word, the martins have been busy! They have laid 20 eggs in 5 nests in less than a week.
6/5- Since the fresh eggs were found yesterday I brought the house down and did another nest check to establish when the eggs in each nest were first laid. Gourd 4 is the only nest I could not establish when the first egg was laid since only three eggs were laid in a period of 5 days.
6/9- 2 eggs were found missing in box 8 and I am afraid the nest and remaining 4 eggs have been abandoned. There are now 6 possible pairs of martins working on building nests and 6 confirmed pairs with eggs in the nest, gourd 4 and Boxes 2, 4, 8, 10 and 13 have eggs.
6/14- Box 8 still has 4 eggs remaining and they look like they are being taken care of so, the mystery will never be solved, where did the other 2 eggs go? There are now 8 families and 33 eggs, two new families since last nest check.
6/19- There are still 8 families; now, 34 eggs total. In addition, box 8 has 3 new hatchlings!
6/24- 8 families have now settled in with 19 hatchlings with 17 eggs left to hatch; for a total of 36 offspring. Box eight is in the news again after another egg up and disappears. 3 hatchlings remain in box 8 and with hope, they will make it to fledging before they get the boot from the nest? On a side note; the martins seemed to be lazy about fighting off any sparrows this year and last week I was vigilant about keeping a couple of sparrows from building any nests in the house. I finally out smarted the two culprits and have not had any more sparrows around (cross my fingers) for several days. If I had any reasonable guess on the mysteries of box 8 it would be that the sparrows were retaliating against the martins for me removing their nests and eggs and chose box 8 to do their damage. But, who can say for sure?
6/29- Looks like the martins in box 13 lost one of their hatchlings and are down to 5. Gourd 4 has two hatchlings with an egg left in the nest that looks like it won't be producing a sibling. Box 4 has a similar situation with 3 hatchlings and one left over egg. Overall things are going well with only one loss this round. The martins are now taking care of 22 hatchlings and 13 eggs for a total of 35 potentially viable fledglings. It's going to be time to treat the nests for mites and blowflies on the next nest check. Spotted the first sign of mites today but the hatchlings are a little young yet to treat the nests.
7/4- I was right on the last nest check, box 4 and gourd 4 had stale eggs, one each and they were removed. The only other possibility for the last stale egg is in box 14 and at this point will have to wait until the martins have fledged. This year the eggs were laid, between different families, far enough apart that some nests are close to fledging and some have very young hatchlings. If I do anymore nest checks I could scare the older birds into fledging early and we don't want that. So, this is the finally tally- Out of 36 eggs laid there were 33 total hatchlings and presumably, 33 fledglings.
Next nest check soon, we'll be looking for what's happened in the nests after the martins have left. Check back!
