The jury is in. I am officially out of the office cave to report final trail stats on the Woolwine House Bluebird Trail (45 nestboxes in 2017). Totals are below for the 2017 season, 3 native species successfully nested. Thanks for your patience–been a tough year for me personally on the homefront. Hope this lines up right. Questions? The photos included are when I moved nestlings that lost their parents and starving (a couple died on the nest) to a new nestbox with other nestlings about the same age to be fostered by the new parent bluebirds. All fledged at the same time in a few more days.
-BLUEBIRDS: 68 nests, 313 eggs, 290 hatched, 273 fledged
-TREE SWALLOWS: 9 nests, 36 eggs, 29 hatched, 29 fledged
-CHICKADEES: 4 nests, 20 eggs, 18 hatched, 18 fledged
-No HOUSE WREN NESTINGS THIS YEAR.
-NO INVASIVE NON-NATIVE HOUSE SPARROWS!
-Total 20 dead/missing nestlings.
-Total 9 eggs missing or removed unhatched eggs (by parents).
-Total 6 unhatched eggs found on fledged nest (this is low!).
-1 box dead adult female on ground to cat predation!
-2 boxes snake predation–none were at the VBS protocol ones.
-2 boxes bear attacks! Lost 4 bluebird young and swallow eggs.
-1 box parents died-moved babies to be fostered at Nestbox 16.
-1 box all nestlings died-deceased removed by parent birds.
-1 box had chronic carpenter bees-babies fledged OK.
-1 box chronic paper wasps. Eradicated! Late bluebird nesting.
-1 box bluebird young died-starvation-parents went missing.
-1 box bluebirds did takeover over tree swallow nest and eggs.
-1 box fledgling found dead on nest. Other siblings made it!
-1 box chickadees beat bluebirds in nesting. Unusual.
-1 paired boxes did well for bluebirds/swallows to nest nearby.
-2 boxes of 2-Hole Mansions again highly successful!
-1 box had no action with any nests this season.
-1 box had first-time tree swallows nesting and early in season.
NOTE: I treat all of the inside of nests (except House Wren stick nests) with organic food-grade diatomaceous earth for the purpose of eradicating blowfly larvae. I counted 25 nests infested with with the larvae, but DEAD, so there was no losses of young.
