EasternPurpleMartin_Cavities_Ray_Jim_CanyonTX_14September2022_Reel4127.mp3

Jim Ray [00:00:00] When the earliest Europeans arrived, they found that southeastern tribes, they were already hosting purple martins in their villages in hollowed-out gourds.

Jim Ray [00:00:10] I read a paper where, and I didn't even know, that these big gourds were Old World. But, I think it's like 10,000 years ago is where they traced some of the earliest gourds to arriving in the, in North America.

Jim Ray [00:00:28] Did they did they come across the Bering Strait or did they float across? It's not really known.

Jim Ray [00:00:35] But this practice of erecting gourds for purple martins, it could go back thousands of years.

Jim Ray [00:00:42] And so people ask, "Well, why did the Native Americans want them in their villages?" Well, they could have recognized the insect control. You could just imagine drying meat out in the open air. Flies were probably a problem. So they might have just appreciated the martins for that.

Jim Ray [00:01:01] But also, like when strangers come on to my lot, my martins react differently than when I'm out there. And so, they could have been a warning system for raids by other tribes or maybe large predators.

Jim Ray [00:01:18] So, you know, either one of those could be the case.

Jim Ray [00:01:21] But once the early Europeans arrived, martins rapidly took to nesting in nooks and crannies in their buildings and structures and actually got quite, quite common.

Jim Ray [00:01:36] But, you know, when the European starling and the house sparrow arrived, the, the starling was released in Central Park by a man that wanted, he wanted to see every bird that was in his native area in Europe. He wanted to see them in the U.S. And usually they were birds that were mentioned by Shakespeare. There's a connection to Shakespeare writings, and so that's how the starling got here. House sparrows were brought over for other reasons, but they quickly competed with native cavity nesters.

Jim Ray [00:02:16] And by 1900, most martins were nesting in managed bird housing, versus in buildings or anything like that.

Jim Ray [00:02:28] But, the purple martin is very adaptable. I have seen them, you know, in broken street lights on occasion. It's very rare. I can't stress enough how rare it is to find them like this. But I went down to the eastern part of the Trans-Pecos, and found them nesting at a swimming pool underneath the canopy of a picnic table - not in a cavity, but on a shelf underneath there, which gives them a competitive advantage over house sparrows and starlings.

Jim Ray [00:03:01] But these kind of nestings in manmade structures other than bird houses are usually short-lived. We tend to want to repair things that are broken. And, sometimes they just don't want a bird's nest in situations like that because of the mess, real or perceived mess.

Jim Ray [00:03:21] But yeah, today, they're they're pretty much in bird houses.

Jim Ray [00:03:26] I can report a a study that I'm involved with that involves Texas Tech and Mississippi State, where martin houses have been put in working forests, in clear cuts, to see if we can lure the martin back into the woods, basically.

Jim Ray [00:03:46] And I can report that in the first year of that study, martins occupied some of those gourd racks.

Jim Ray [00:03:56] And so the objective is to keep moving them closer and closer to mature forests that would have cavities and see if they might, some of them might revert back.