Gourds -- An Important Update

(Spring'98 The Scout Report Vol 5(1), p.2 (spring'98)

New Thinking on how to Hang Gourds

It is now thought that gourds should not swing in any direction and should be stabilized when they are hung. Also, wire holes should be drilled in gourd stems from front-to-back to prevent any front-to-back gourd motion. It may be alright if landlords choose their gourds to swing from side-to-side, but this is not desirable. If gourds are wired securely, the eggs or nestlings will not roll about inside the gourds due to parent arrivals, winds or predation.

Securely-wired gourds with the wire holes drilled front to back may help in another matter. One common complaint regarding typical, vertically-hung gourds is that when the colony is under owl predation, owls can, indeed, tip the gourds, to access the birds inside. If the gourds are stable, owls will not easily tip the gourds and access the birds. If your present gourds stems are drilled from side-to side, all you need do is to re-drill new holes from front-to-back and caulk the old ones closed.

Old Thinking

It used to be that when I discussed the swing of gourds that I told gourd- interested landlords that gourds could swing from front-to-back OR from side-to-side, but that gourds should never swing or twist 360 degrees around. When the holes, through which the gourd wires are strung, are drilled from side-to-side with the birds' entrance hole in the center (of the two wire holes), the gourd swings from front-to-back. It is this front-to-back motion that is not considered to be in the martins' best interest.

RE: front-to-back motion of gourds: Many times, with nesting subadult martin pairs, young adult birds do not use much nesting material to construct their nests inside gourds or houses. If there is no solid nestcup inside the larger capacity gourds, and, eggs or nestlings, are present, a forward push momentum on the gourd that could dislodge the eggs in the shoddily-made nests when the young parents land on the entrance hole on these gourds. The eggs could roll inside and crack. Eggs or nestlings could even roll out of the entrance hole if the center of weight has been drastically tipped to the front by the parents, the wind or predators.

For years, one of the Nature Society complaints regarding gourds is that nestlings fall from gourds and perish. Perhaps, if gourds were all wired so that they did not move at all, fewer young martin nestlings would not fall out of gourds.

Why do some martins build poor nests?

Some poor nest builders are full grown ASY birds who just routinely build slipshod nests. But the majority of poor nest builders are young birds who are either inexperienced or late arrivals to the colony site, or both. For many subadult martins, learning to build good strong nests is a matter of maturity and practice. It is widely known by landlords that such young pairs do not always make good nests, and sometimes, only a few pieces of nesting materials are inside the martin housing. As for the late arrivals, these are the last waves of martins to arrive. The late arrivals are short on time and hastily build a nest and shortly afterwards, lay their eggs in these nests. These quickie nests tend to be on the Spartan side, relative to the amount of nesting materials.

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