[TN-Bird] Woodpeckers

I have pasted some information about woodpeckers from Mike McGrath's radio
program, You Bet Your Garden.  Some folks might recognize his name as the
former editor of Organic Gardening magazine.  The show airs on WPLN AM 1430
Saturday mornings at 7.  An acquaintance of mine had good luck with the
monofilament suggestion.
Thais Carr
Thompsons Station


 Yes, its mea culpa time here at YBYG! For many years I have been telling
people that woodpeckers drilling holes into their homes was a good sign?that
the birds were revealing that carpenter bees or wood eating insects were
trying to move in with you. And yes, I did recently suggest that spraying
the side of a home under attack with a foul smelling repellant might drive
them away for a bit. But our friend in Philly is correct; these birds are
felt to have very little sense of smell?OR taste, so even getting a nice big
mouthful of deer repellant might not get them to quit work early.

AND I¹ve been wrong about the insect warning part as well. Noted woodpecker
expert Jerry Jackson, Ph.D., Professor of Biology at Florida Gulf Coast
University in Ft. Myers, explains that when woodpeckers peck, they are
probably seeking bugs in your boards less than 10% of the time?and most of
the bugs they DO eat in such situations are harmless ones just trying to
hide between the shingles. Sigh. But at least he adds that this is a great
time for me to get the real story out, as we are about to enter nesting
season, when many of you will have to contend with avian home invasions.

As Dr. Jackson explains, every individual bird?male and female?makes its own
roost cavity in which to live. The preferred place is in a ?snag¹, an old
dead tree that¹s still standing but whose wood has become nice and soft,
which is why it¹s very good to leave such things on the outskirts of your
property. 

When a pair mates, typically in the early Spring, the male¹s roost will
become a nest, but he will send the female back to HER roost every night; so
that¹s two holes for just this couple. Add in the fact that the birds make a
new roost every year (because the old one gets pretty nasty inside), plus
replacements when a tree falls or a homeowner evicts them from the
insulation, and of course, all the new roosts the young birds make when THEY
leave the nest, and we¹re talking a lot of woodworking activity.

³There¹s a lot of excavation going on at this time of year,² assures Dr.
Jackson, who adds that people inadvertently make their wood-covered homes
targets when they clear all the trees off a new property. His advice is to
leave as many trees standing as possible, and when you must cut one down,
³leave a 15 foot high stump instead of cutting it all the way to the ground.
Woodpeckers just might use that tree for a nest instead of your home.²

And what should a homeowner do when a woodpecker DOES decide to take up
housekeeping inside their four walls instead of a tree?

³If this has been a problem in the past, erecting an invisible barrier might
deter them before they can start to build their nest,² he explains. ³Hang
lengths of monofilament nylon?fishing line?a few inches out from the
undersides of your eaves every four to six inches along the side of your
house. Let each line reach almost to the ground and hang a metal washer on
the end to weight it down. This will create a screen that will keep the
birds away, but that also will be invisible when you look at the house.

³If you are already under attack, hang a big sheet of plastic?like a
painter¹s drop cloth?over the area they¹ve excavated; the slick plastic will
prevent them from gaining a foothold and buy you some time. Then nail an
appropriately sized birdhouse or nesting box over the area they¹re trying to
excavate; a bluebird house for a downy woodpecker and a larger one for birds
like flickers and red-bellied woodpeckers that typically reach a foot in
length. 

³Make sure the bird house is made of rough wood, so they can get a foothold,
and remove the perch if there is one. Before you put it in place, fill it
with wood shavings?the type that pet stores sell for hamsters and such is
ideal. They need to excavate when they build a nest, and the shavings will
fill this need. They¹ll spend their time throwing the shavings on the ground
instead of removing your insulation.

³You can even make this a permanent solution by buying a birdhouse with
hinged walls for easy cleaning out, or by modifying a house so that one wall
opens up enough that you can easily clean it in the off-season. Typically,
woodpeckers don¹t reuse their nests because they become filled with feces
and other disagreeable stuff, but they could well re-use a box that has been
cleaned out and then refilled with a fresh run of wood shavings.²

Luckily, I was right about one thing. Dr. Jackson assures me that having
woodpeckers around is very beneficial: ³They eat lots of beetles and other
pest insects.² 

http://www.gardensalive.com/article.asp?ai=852



=================NOTES TO SUBSCRIBER=====================

The TN-Bird Net requires you to SIGN YOUR MESSAGE with
first and last name, CITY (TOWN) and state abbreviation.
You are also required to list the COUNTY in which the birds
you report were seen.  The actual DATE OF OBSERVATION should
appear in the first paragraph.
_____________________________________________________________
      To post to this mailing list, simply send email to:
                    tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
_____________________________________________________________ 
                To unsubscribe, send email to:
                 tn-bird-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 
            with 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field.
______________________________________________________________
  TN-Bird Net is owned by the Tennessee Ornithological Society 
       Neither the society(TOS) nor its moderator(s)
        endorse the views or opinions expressed
        by the members of this discussion group.
 
         Moderator: Wallace Coffey, Bristol, TN
                 wallace@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
                ------------------------------
                Assistant Moderator Andy Jones
                         Cleveland, OH
                -------------------------------
               Assistant Moderator Dave Worley
                          Rosedale, VA
__________________________________________________________
         
          Visit the Tennessee Ornithological Society
              web site at http://www.tnbirds.org
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

                          ARCHIVES
 TN-Bird Net Archives at http://www.freelists.org/archives/tn-bird/

                       MAP RESOURCES
Tenn.Counties Map at http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/states/tennessee3.gif
Aerial photos to complement google maps http://local.live.com

_____________________________________________________________

Other related posts: