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Where can I get a bluebird box?
Go to Buy a Nest Box for info on where to buy a Bella Vista Bluebird Society bluebird house and have it installed.
Local hardware and DIY stores.
Home Depot, Lowe's, Orscheln and other local hardware and DIY stores sell commercial bluebird houses, mounting posts, and PVC pipe. Commercially purchased bluebird houses:
- should be made of sturdy wood to keep predators out.
- should have a circular hole no larger than one and half inch for Eastern Bluebirds.
- should easily open on the top or side for monitoring.
Go to Nest Box Plans to build your own box.
Where to place your bluebird box?
Bluebirds feed in areas of short grass or sparse vegetation, locating their prey from elevated perches. Install your boxes in areas that provide open space with adequate perches, such as open woodlots, pastures, orchards, hayfields, and roadsides.
- Place houses 200 yards or more from areas likely to be inhabited by House Sparrows.
- Avoid areas where domestic or feral cats or other predators are common.
- Boxes should be placed 100 yards apart to avoid territorial disputes between bluebird pairs. However, placing boxes in pairs may reduce competition between bluebirds and swallows by allowing one pair of each species to nest in close proximity.
- Install boxes 4 to 5 feet above the ground and face the openings southeast,
- Use a PVC or large predator guard to keep mice, snakes and small rodents from taking up residence or destroying the nests.
- Face boxes toward trees or shrubs that are within 50 feet of box so that young birds can fly easily to a perch when they leave the nest.
- Nearby power lines, trees and shrubs also provide roost sites for adults.
- Do not place nest boxes near brushy vegetation along forest edges where house wrens will likely occur, unless you want wrens.
- Avoid placing nest boxes where chemicals are sprayed frequently.
- To avoid ant problems, do not place nest boxes on wooden fence posts that are rotten or deteriorating.
- Obtain permission before installing nest boxes on utility poles.
What to do about bluebird predators?
Ants. For an ant infested nest box, follow this procedure:
- Carefully remove the old nest with eggs or chicks in it. Check the nest to see if ants are in the nest itself. If not, reuse the nest. If yes, use a clean nest which you have saved from a previous box. Transfer the eggs/chicks into the new nest. Use caution if the chicks are near the fledging stage to be sure they don’t try to fly away.
- Put a new box on the existing pole and put the nest with chicks into this box. Spray the infested box with an ant killer. Do not reuse this box until next season.
Wasps. For a wasp infested nest box, follow this procedure:
- When checking you boxes, always look at the ceiling. If a wasp nest is started, use your spatula/scraper to swat any wasps or to scrape the wasp nest from the ceiling. Do this throughout the season, constantly keeping wasp nests out of the box.
- Rubbing a bar of soap on the inside of a box will keep wasp nests from sticking to the wooden box, but you may have to apply it several times throughout the season. See Paper Wasps - Native and European for more detail and suggestions.
- Carry cooking spray in your monitoring bag. Spray the wasp nest and wasps. This will kill the wasps and not contaminate the nest box the way a pesticide will.
Blowflies and other Parasitic Larva.
Sparrows. For a sparrow infested nest box, follow this procedure:
- House (English) Sparrows kill bluebirds, swallows, and their chicks in the nest box. They are the most difficult pest we face with bluebird trails, and they must not be allowed to fledge their chicks in our boxes.
- If a House Sparrow takes over one of our boxes, allow her to build a nest and lay eggs. THEN remove the nest & eggs and dispose of it. The sparrow may try a second or even a third time, but just repeat the above each time. They are very fast in building nests & laying eggs, so it is important that you monitor weekly. If they persist, it is probably best to move the box to a location where sparrows will not be a problem.
- Another possibility is to plug the opening (rag or newspaper) as soon as you notice sparrow activity. Leave it plugged for 2 weeks, then try again.
- For more info on House Sparrows, go to Managing House Sparrows
See also the BVBBS Procedure Nest Box Pests.
Feeding bluebirds.
Prime your feeders with: mealworms, suet dough, fruit, and sunflower bits as well as eggshell bits in spring and summer.
Mealworms
- Mealworms are not worms at all. Mealworms are actually the larvae of the darkling beetle. Dried mealworms are simply these mealworms dried out by either freeze-drying or heating. You can buy them in bulk from Amazon.com or locally from Orscheln, and The Bluebird Shed.
- Dried mealworms are most popular for birds like bluebirds, robins, starlings, thrushes, wrens, blackbirds, tits, woodpeckers and jays.
- Dried mealworms can be fed all year round, not just when food can be short in the winter. They are a specially welcome help for struggling parents in the breeding season. Just make sure there is plenty of water available.
- Dried mealworms can be fed by sprinkling straight onto the ground to encourage natural foraging, or putting them loose on bird tables, mixing them into your usual seed mix.
Bluebird Pudding
1 part peanut butter (1 ¼ cups =18 oz)
2 parts lard ( 2 ½ cups)
5 parts yellow cornmeal (6 ½ cups)
Melt the lard in microwave for 2 ¼ minutes (medium-high setting). Then let the peanut butter melt in the hot lard, using more microwave if necessary. Add cornmeal last. Mix well.
These quantities fill a 4 # Armour lard tub, which makes a good storage container
Refrigerate overnight before feeding, then store the leftovers in the refrigerator.
