Landlords needed for martins, bluebirds

One of them is the largest swallow in North America. The other is a medium-sized thrush, known mostly for being "pretty." Still, purple martins and Eastern bluebirds have a lot in common -- especially in terms of needing help to find a good place to live.

Both species would be in real trouble if humans had not started supplying suitable places for them to nest. In fact, for Kansans who have been doing that, now is the time to prepare for the 2008 nesting season. Both birds prefer to return to the same area or even to the same house year after year.

Purple martins are the only bird species in the eastern United States that are totally dependent on human-made living quarters; they have been that way for more than 100 years.

Native Americans were hanging up empty gourds for purple martins long before any Europeans arrived on the continent. When huge amounts of nesting habitat were removed, they came to rely on human help.

Purple martins are the reason people put up apartment-style birdhouses on tall poles, hoping the birds will nest there and control the area's mosquitoes.

Unfortunately, purple martins and mosquitoes tend to fly in different air space. Still, just one purple martin can consume up to 2,000 flying insects per day. Their usual prey includes wasps, moths, flies, grasshoppers, midges, cicadas, stinkbugs, beetles, ballooning spiders, and dragonflies.

In the 1960s and '70s, bluebirds were getting hard to find until people started installing bluebird trails and nesting boxes. Now, they too, are making a comeback.

Their houses are harder to notice than the purple martins' apartments, though. Eastern bluebirds like open spaces and a nesting box that reminds them of an old tree cavity or wood fencepost. From there, they specialize in eating berries and insects that stay close to the ground.

Both birds will be starting to nest in Kansas during March, so their "landlords" should be cleaning out their houses or boxes, making any needed repairs, and making sure the housing is in correct position.

"Landlords" also will have to keep watch to ensure that more aggressive house sparrows and European starlings do not quickly co-opt the purple martins' and bluebirds' space.

More information about the needed preparation for purple martins is available on the Web at http://www.purplemartin.org/. Information on getting ready for Eastern bluebirds is at http://www.nabluebirdsociety.org/

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Editor's Note: Delta George is a K-State Research and Extension agriculture and 4-H extension agent assigned to Bourbon County. She may be reached at (620) 223-3720.