FOAM LAKE BIRDING
No 188
Finally the
crows are back – winter or not. Also, I
have seen several Rough Legged Hawks and, to my surprise, a lone Bald Eagle
perched in a tree along the highway. To
date I have not seen any robins nor bluebirds.
Even the juncos are not back yet. However, they all should be here
soon.
In any case
it is that time of year when bird fanciers should be thinking of putting out
birdhouses for the spring nesting season.
This is especially true if one has to build new houses for whatever
reason. Existing bird houses require
much less time even if repairs are necessary.
Bird houses
that have been occupied in previous years require very little effort to make
them ready for the upcoming spring. Some
people feel that it is necessary to clean the bird houses every year. If bird lice are a concern one need not
worry. Bird lice require a body
temperature of nearly 40C to stay alive.
Even human body temperature (36C - 37C) is too cold. Our frigid winters completely sterilize the
nests. One always has to keep in mind
that all cavity nesters used to nest in abandoned woodpecker nests and nobody
went around cleaning out those nests. We
cannot and perhaps should not apply human standards to birds. They are not people with feathers. After all they drink out of mud puddles.
For new
bird house construction I will start out with the most common and easiest bird
house to build. Of all birds the House
Wrens are the least finicky about their bird houses and most easily satisfied
with anything that remotely resembles a bird house. Dimensions can vary from 4” by 5” to 8”by 10”
and everything in between. A one inch
hole is the perfect size as it allows the wren to get in and out of the house
but excludes all other birds – especially House Sparrows. The most common material is wood – usually
scrap wood. Wooden houses should be
painted to preserve them. Many
commercially prepared bird houses are made of lightweight aluminum. Aluminum is very good as it does not absorb
heat and remains cool throughout the hot summer days. Even larger steel(tin) cans can be used. As kids my brothers and I would punch one
inch holes in tobacco cans and tie them to trees. They were always occupied by wrens. Steel cans will heat up to dangerously high
levels so care must be taken to mount them in good, day long shade. The houses can be as fancy or as plain as one
desires. Either way the wrens will be
perfectly happy.
It should
be noted that wrens spend a great deal of time on the ground and therefore need
good ground cover for protection. A yard
without shrubs, flowers and so on will make it very difficult to attract
wrens.
This week’s
picture of a wren on a dwarf cedar was taken just outside our solarium
window. The bird houses are of the three
we have in our yard. The dark (brown)
house (no photo) is in our front yard and has had wrens almost every year since
we put it up about 20 years ago. The
colourful one that we purchased last year stayed vacant. The hanging house was set out two years ago in
our back yard for Tree Swallows but a wren beat them to it. I never got around to painting this house –
maybe this spring.
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