Spar-o door

Laura Dore · Fri Apr 25, 2014 8:12 am

Can someone tell me how these traps work? I have a couple of those wire insert traps, but they won't fit past the railings on my old Trio MK12 without taking things apart to remove them. My martins are about ready to start their families, and I don't want any revenge taking going on by continuing to yank out the sparrow nests.

Fri Apr 25, 2014 8:15 am

The trap door replaces the regular door - the doors lift off the hinge rod easily, and the trap door goes in the same way. They are a great trap, especially since have reduced hole and won't capture martins. Putting two SD-1 traps side by side seems to work very well.

Since you have some insert traps, you could take the railings off and start using those right now, though. You can make a hole reducer, entry of 1-1/4 inches, to fasten over martin entrance.

Laura Dore · Fri Apr 25, 2014 8:22 am

But, how do you get the sparrow out without it getting away when you open the door?

John Miller · Fri Apr 25, 2014 8:40 am

The traps come with a little funnel you insert in the hole, with a clear plastic bag over the funnel and the sparrow ideally jumps out into the bag. ..sometimes the sparrow won't cooperate and if you are not careful attaching the funnel, sparrow will shoot out the open hole before the funnel is snugly attached. Long fingers and very slowly opening the door works too. I find the process cumbersome, but the door trap is so darn effective -- sparrows love entering the small hole -- that I continue to use it. Sometimes when we shim an entrance otherwise to keep martins out of a trap inserted in the cavity, house sparrows see the shim and won't enter right away; usually by nightfall they will. John

Fri Apr 25, 2014 9:13 am

As John says, the removal cup or funnel has two clips, I found that it snaps into trap entrance nicely and stays put. If a sparrow is reluctant to fly out through the tunnel (which puts them in a clear plastic bag that is secured to the removal cup/tunnel/funnel - I insert a long thin piece of wire or bamboo skewer - it slides in under the door and I wiggle it back & forth, giving their feet a shove. They usually zip right out.

To clip the removal cup onto entrance, I use one hand to lift the trap lever with external thumbscrew, while sliding cup over entrance with other hand. It is a nifty, well-designed trap. That and a wire sparrow trap are my top favorites for HOSP control, personally.

EDIT: As Dorn mentions below, if the sparrow sees you through the trap removal cup, it will want to stay in the house. I try to stand off to the side a bit instead of directly in line with/in view of the trap removal cup.

Laura Dore · Fri Apr 25, 2014 9:13 am

Ok. Thanks. Gonna give one a shot.

DornCounty · Fri Apr 25, 2014 9:21 am

Spar-o-door is the single best invention by Trio ever... OK.. not really.. but I really like it. I've trapped 400+ sparrows with the Spar-o-door. Works great. in fact Monday I trapped a male and a female within 5 mins.

What I do is peak in through the trap opening to see if the trip was an actual trap of a sparrow.. if there is one in it I will put in the funnel and bag into the opening(an opaque bag works best, it lets light in without the sparrow being able to see you, if they do they go back in) Once the bag is in place use a piece of wire and poke it in the little holes in the back cavity and just slap it around. Typically this will scare the bird into the bag. Prior to this wire trick I waited minutes for sparrows to come out into the bags.. now it is rare that it takes more than 15 seconds.

My biggest issue with the spar-o-door is how the vibration of raising and lowering of the house can trip the gate. I make a slight mod to the doors by fliling a slight slope on the end of the trip prop.. that slope causes the vibration to actually keep the trip on the gate. But the slope is gentle enough that a sparrow can still trip the bar and get trapped.

John Miller · Fri Apr 25, 2014 2:19 pm

Glad to have learned about the "skewer" technique. Thought I knew all there was to know.

John M

Laura Dore · Sat May 03, 2014 7:19 pm

Ok. Got my spar-o-door yesterday and used it today. Got the male within 5 minutes, reset it and raised the house and got the female in another 5 minutes. That thing is awesome!

Sat May 03, 2014 7:41 pm

Anyone who owns a Trio house should have one or two - they are terrific traps! Another way to use them is to scour your neighborhood for an unused Trio house, offer to buy it (cheap!) and take it away for them - use it for a trap house. You can set it on a shorter pole, some landlords put the mounting socket in a tub with cement, so the whole trap house is portable. Load one side with spare o doors - you can clean up a lot of house sparrows quickly by setting the trap house near an occupied martin system. Love that the trap has smaller entrance holes that won't trap martins (but it does require careful monitoring, as do all traps - you can catch wrens, tree swallows, bluebirds).

Laura Dore · Sat May 03, 2014 7:48 pm

I'm already using another of my houses as a trap house since I only have one pair of martins this year. Don't know what's happened since I had six pairs last year. I may now have a tree encroachment problem. And, unfortunately, the price of the spar-o-door makes it difficult to purchase several. But, I'll do what I can to lower the HOSP population.

DornCounty · Mon May 05, 2014 11:59 am

Laura Dore wrote:Ok. Got my spar-o-door yesterday and used it today. Got the male within 5 minutes, reset it and raised the house and got the female in another 5 minutes. That thing is awesome!

told ya they were great.

Laura Dore · Mon May 05, 2014 1:08 pm

Yesterday, I reset it in a different compartment that i had seen a little activity in and raised the house. When it got to the top, I heard it snap closed and thought I had tripped it when it reached the top. So I lowered the house again to reset, opened the door, and the stinking male Sparrow flew out. Dang it! He got away but has not returned. But I DID get his woman! :v))

DornCounty · Mon May 05, 2014 1:14 pm

Laura Dore wrote:Yesterday, I reset it in a different compartment that i had seen a little activity in and raised the house. When it got to the top, I heard it snap closed and thought I had tripped it when it reached the top. So I lowered the house again to reset, opened the door, and the stinking male Sparrow flew out. Dang it! He got away but has not returned. But I DID get his woman! :v))

Nice... one time I removed a sparrow from the trap... reset it.. and out flew a 2nd.

jr 2 · Mon May 05, 2014 1:30 pm

I usually raise the shutter a little and sneak a look in or pull the door a little and look under;;;the wind yesterday blowed 1 of mine down a couple of times;;have a good year;;;;;;jr2

mickey53 · Tue May 06, 2014 11:06 am

We use a small wooden house built to fit the Spar O door to trap our HsSp. The side door has an interior screen to allow ID of trapped bird. If sparrow, hold large mouthed plastic jar over hole, open flipper and he flies into jar. Hold jar tight to house, slide to one side and slip jar quickly onto the lid. We have caught 3 male HsSp within few minutes of setting the door. Occasional tree swallow gets caught so only set trap door when sparrows are seen.

Cecile

DottieL · Mon Jun 02, 2014 3:18 pm

I've been so successful catching HOSP with the Spar-o-door... Lucky today I saw a beak constantly going in and out off the tripped trap. When I began to retrieve the devil bird from the plastic bag, I saw an orange breast and thought uh oh! I had never caught a bluebird before, but today was the day.
I didn't even realize they were small enough to get into the trap door. I had not yet read all the good stuff on the FORUM regarding BB entering the Martin house. But now I know to be very careful and prompt and watchful.

DornCounty · Mon Jun 02, 2014 4:20 pm

DottieL wrote:I've been so successful catching HOSP with the Spar-o-door... Lucky today I saw a beak constantly going in and out off the tripped trap. When I began to retrieve the devil bird from the plastic bag, I saw an orange breast and thought uh oh! I had never caught a bluebird before, but today was the day.
I didn't even realize they were small enough to get into the trap door. I had not yet read all the good stuff on the FORUM regarding BB entering the Martin house. But now I know to be very careful and prompt and watchful.

Amazing those guys can fit in, but they do. That's why its important to monitor every trap set.

Bill Hyde · Mon Jun 02, 2014 9:59 pm

I most heartily agree that the Spare-o-Door is wonderful

I had a Trio Castle 24 that never had a nesting pair of martins, so I retired it from service. Not wanting to waste the two Spare-o-Door traps, I invested in a couple Bo-9 gourds, tinkered a bit and fitted the traps to the fronts of the gourds

Problem solved.

msalcido · Tue Jun 03, 2014 10:29 am

Bill Hyde wrote:I most heartily agree that the Spare-o-Door is wonderful I had a Trio Castle 24 that never had a nesting pair of martins, so I retired it from service. Not wanting to waste the two Spare-o-Door traps, I invested in a couple Bo-9 gourds, tinkered a bit and fitted the traps to the fronts of the gourds
Problem solved.

Bill - do you have the tunnels on the B09's? I have a B09 that is currently in use by a sparrow but it has the tunnel on it. I have a universal trap but it's to big to fit inside the gourd. How did you use the spare-o-door with your B09?