There are a number of simple things you can do to attract birds to your nest boxes and ensure that they nest successfully.  Try these tips and enjoy your success.

Location

• If you want to attract bluebirds, locate your nest boxes in the open, on mowed turf greater than 10 feet away from any trees and greater than 100 feet from water.  Eggs are pale blue and nests are constructed of woven grass.

• Tree swallows often nest in close proximity to one another and prefer open sites where they feed on insects while in flight. Tree swallows will readily take up residence in boxes placed close to water, and may compete with bluebirds for boxes placed in open areas. Nests are made of woven grass lined with feathers; eggs are white.

• House wrens appear to be generalists, nesting in all locations and having similar success in all locations.  House wrens will often construct “dummy nests,” stuffing nest boxes with small twigs, but not nesting in them.  These nests serve to keep other birds out of a house wren’s territory. Eggs are white heavily marked with browns.

• Chickadees or nuthatches commonly use nest boxes, generally placed in or close to woods.  Chickadee nests are lined with plant down, moss, feathers, and hair; eggs are white with pale reddish-brown markings.  Nuthatches nests and eggs are similar to chickadees with bark shreds, hair, and small feathers used as nesting materials and white to pinkish-white eggs marked with reddish-brown.

Monitoring

Briefly open your nest boxes every week or two to monitor progress.  It’s fun to watch the nest take shape, see the eggs laid, and then observe the young as they grow.  Monitoring enables you to record how many young birds fledge successfully each year and share your good results with others.

Predator Guards

Recent research suggests that predator guards are highly effective in preventing mammals and snakes from preying on bird eggs and young.  “If a box is worth erecting and monitoring, it’s worth protecting,” says Dr. Mark Stanback, Associate Professor of Biology at Davidson College in North Carolina.  Stanback and his students studied tree mounted nest boxes on golf courses over several years.  They discovered that raccoons, cats, and opossums were responsible for just over half of the 385 cases of predation they noted, while snakes were responsible for the remaining nest failures. 

Stanback and his students also compared nesting success in boxes mounted on poles provided with stovepipe-style predator guards versus those mounted on trees.  Nests in tree boxes suffered a 28 percent predation rate.  Those with predator guards suffered only a two percent predation rate.  

Yearly clean out

Remove old nests once the young have fledged.  Since the box is used as a cradle, rather than a house, the young birds don’t need it once they are old enough to fly.  An old paint scraper is a useful tool for lifting out the used nest.  Cleaning out the box will prevent a build up of mites and other parasites that prey on birds.