Increased Housing for 2016
Thanks to donations, Menunkatuck Audubon was able to increase its purple martin housing at Hammonasset in Madison at Chase Pond.
We add one new 12 unit house bringing us to 60 units at Chase Pond and 48 at Meig's Point at the Nature Center.
We anticipate the new gourd colony in Guilford Salt Meadow Sanctuary to increase in population. Last year we had 5 nesting pair for the
first time. There are 24 gourds there so we have plenty of room for more families.
We add one new 12 unit house bringing us to 60 units at Chase Pond and 48 at Meig's Point at the Nature Center.
We anticipate the new gourd colony in Guilford Salt Meadow Sanctuary to increase in population. Last year we had 5 nesting pair for the
first time. There are 24 gourds there so we have plenty of room for more families.
More Opportunities for Education with Public Nest Checks
In the interest of promoting more people to understand the need for purple martin colonies and to understand what is involved in managing a colony, we will be setting up dates where interested people can watch and participate in our regular nest checks. We will post dates and times for checks at both the Madison and Guilford sites.
New Emergency Feedings will be Attempted
Purple Martins are a population at risk due to many factors. They rely on humans for housing in our area and they need human intervention. Our housing designs are meant to deter predation, the openings, the entrance tunnels and the depth of the units. Invasive bird species like the House Sparrow want to nest in the purple martin cavities, they can be quite malicious birds, killing off many of the babies or pecking the eggs so they won't hatch. Sparrows are prolific breeders having two clutches a year, easily outnumbering the martins. Part of the responsibility of a landlord is to help control the invasives, not a pleasant job but a necessary one. Weather is another factor we can't control but through the use of training martins to accept emergency feeding colonies have been saved from long expanses of cold, rainy "bug-free" days. This year we are going to attempt to "train" our birds to accept alternative food like crickets, mealworms and even scrambled or hard boiled eggs! The training is going to be the fun part, since they only eat "flying" food, we have to train them to catch the food we shoot up to them via slingshots and spoons. The idea is to then transition them to a feeding platform. This should be fun...We will try to get video!
Food for the martins...eggshells before they are cooked, and the scrambled eggs!