|
April 26, 2007  Boxed In Urban sprawl is a blight on the landscape. Once-natural areas are eaten up while birds and mammals are driven away. Urban sprawl, in my book, earns the same comment as trees being brought down - "What can be put in a tree’s place that is as beautiful?" Unfortunately, the latest urban blight north of town is of my doing. Like many things my brush with urban blight began innocently. Last year I had access to lots of scrap wood at the same time I house-sat a house with a well-appointed wood workshop. This resulted in a stack of bird boxes, about 40 in all, which then spent the remainder of winter leaning against my own woodshed wall. Come spring I would have to find homes for all these homes. Until now I’ve been quite satisfied just putting up the odd bird box around the yard, or replacing a box in need of repair, or experimenting with an occasional new placing. It all worked so fine when dealing with a few boxes. Now though, forty bird boxes stare accusingly at me each time I look out the side window of the house. Their empty Cyclops-like single-eyed gaze creates a previously unfelt pressure. I felt that maybe the answer lay just north of town at 101 Mile Marsh. This marsh is a typical Cariboo Parkland pond with tule rushes and a sedge perimeter. I’m not good at estimating acres or hectares but I’d guess the fenced area, a project of Ducks Unlimited Canada, is roughly 300 hundred feet on each side. There were already six bird boxes here that I placed last year. It was a modest effort reflecting the number of boxes on hand. Though no Mountain Bluebirds had nested in any of the boxes, four pairs of Tree Swallows had raised broods. This year would be different. First, I wanted to encourage more Bluebird activity. To that end I replaced one of each of the paired boxes at the 101 Mile Marsh with big plank boxes with one-and-five eighths inch openings. Last year it came to my attention, while watching Bluebirds at another locale, that holes of 1.5 inches would uncomfortably admit a Bluebird, so perhaps bigger holes would be more appealing. Boxes are generally paired in close proximity so two Tree Swallows will claim one box then drive other Tree Swallows away from the second nesting box. The Tree Swallows in the first box don’t see Bluebirds as competition so they will allow a pair of Bluebirds to nest in the second nearby box. Next I decided to place just three pairs of boxes close together. If I provided boxes for more than one Bluebird pair per fence side I would end up crowding them. The fence next to Highway 97 was not a suitable place for nest boxes so I had just three sides of 101 Marsh with which to contend. In between the three pairs of close-placed boxes I hung several single boxes a distance from each other so that the Tree Swallows could tolerate each other. I spent several days watching and adjusting the distance between the boxes just to make sure that the Tree Swallows paired up at each box have only occasional scuffles when interlopers try to force their way in. A pair of Mountain Bluebirds has already chosen one of the boxes as their own. And another cause for celebration, a second pair of Bluebirds is scouting out some of the other box locations. This morning I visited the 101 marsh again and decided that the fence line could tolerate a few more Tree Swallow boxes. But it was not all work. On my way around the perimeter I watched a lot of birds and marveled at the sights abounding this time of year. One interesting thing I saw was a pair of Black-capped Chickadees busily excavating a nest hole in a small poplar. I sighted a Three-toed Woodpecker drumming atop a snapped off pine, a bird that managed to elude me all winter long. Priding myself in being able to tell the various Woodpeckers apart by their drumming, I paused and listened to the cadence of the Three-toed, a bird I’d only heard drum once before. Its drumming bore a remarkable similarity to that of the largest of all local Woodpeckers, the Pileated. By the time my circuitous box hanging journey brought me back to the highway I had recorded 39 bird species including my first Empidonax Flycatcher of the year. The grand total of bird boxes at 101 Marsh now stands at 18 and this includes a duck box I hung several years ago. That box, by the way, looks like it will be used this year by a Common Goldeneye. The configuration of the boxes I hung goes like this: On the south side - six boxes, on the west side – 5 boxes and on the north side – 5 boxes. One errant box is wired to the back of an information sign. I believe one more bird box can be shoe-horned on the north and another on the west side fence without causing the Tree Swallows any undo stress. And now, thanks to 101 Mile Marsh, my stack of bird boxes has significantly dwindled. The only boxes still stacked against the woodshed are those that I feel are somewhat inferior in construction. The misfits that lack clean-out flaps, or those built in rather eccentric fashion as dictated by some strange boards I happened upon. They too may eventually find a home if some lucky marsh should signal that it is box-deprived. To e-mail Tom CLICK HERE To look at previous column CLICK HERE |
