Purple Martin Forum

I also just bought a Troyer T-14. I removed the Conley entrances and added clinger tunnels from S&K. I can’t wait to put it up this weekend.

Kegger,

That’s slick right there! I wish I was that creative. Maybe one day you can share or sell those plans!

Thanks for the advice Dave. Before I spend >$1,000 I wanted to get some input from the experienced folks like yourself here. Last year I had an old S&K barn and a homemade aluminum house on telescopic poles. While I had a great year in my book, I did realize after a storm snapped one of my poles in ...

Looking for some advice for all of you on the best house to get for my area, south Louisiana. We don’t have really cold weather here but we do get extreme heat. Last year I had two cheap houses that did well (8 pairs for my 2nd year), but were hard to lower and clean. I was looking to upgrade and bu...

Thanks for the info, crazy how COVID is affecting everything. If it’s close in cost, I would probably buy Vs build to save time. Still looking but I’m going to have to buy something for next year after my old tri-tel pole broke in half after a storm.

Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind for sure. Just have to decide if I want to build vs buy as well.

Thanks Mark, I will definitely continue to offer both houses and gourds since 4 of the 8 pair I had used the houses. I want something tat will last and our heat and humidity and moisture is steering me away from anything made from wood.

As this season comes to an end for my colony I’m looking forward to upgrading to a better set up next year. Last year was my first successful year with one pair and this year I had 8 nesting pair. My colony has fledged 28 babies so far and the last 4 Babies should fledge any day and they’ll be gone....

Thanks! I let it play today and they seemed to be fine with it. I may just play for an hour or so in the morning and see what happens. The pair appear to be two young martins, the male is a sub adult. I did see some mature martins on my house and perches two days ago but haven’t seen them since. All...

Newbie here..... I’ve been playing the dawnsong for about a week or two and I finally have a pair that is building a nest in one of my gourds. I noticed when I started playing it I was seeing anywhere between 8-10 martins flying around going in my house and gourds. So far only one pair is building a...

Well, I’ve had a bunch of visitors stop by my house set up but none have stuck. One day I had 6 circling but they hung out for the day and were gone by the evening. I had one male stay the night in my house one night and was gone the next day. I’ve played daytime chatter from an mp3 file I had on a ...

Thanks for the info Tom! The aluminum house that I got from my grandpa has 6x9 compartments but the s&k barn only has 6x6. Maybe next year I can try to customize the apartments to make them bigger! I’ll keep everyone in the loop, I’m ready to see some birds!

Also is the decoy arrangement critical?

Looking for a little advice on attracting some Martins. Last year I had a S&K barn house and had quite a few visitors but none nested. This year I added some BO-9 gourds to that pole and another house that my grandpa gave me and asked me to refurbish. I put 6 decoys on the houses but my question is,...