[Mnbird] Wood duck houses

[DONALD GRUSSING Owner]

My neighbor's house (which like mine was abandoned last year) had a squirrel nest over the wood shavings and two dead grey squirrels. It is a wooden house which he built. Now it is refreshed and ready. 

My house was just as we left it in late spring after the hen had abandoned nine eggs. After she quit sitting, we ditched the eggs and replaced the shavings. The shavings yesterday looked just as they did last summer. Untouched. Intact. With not a single leaf added. Our pond dried up so I am blaming the drought. 

We have a few wood ducks around this spring and higher water levels so we will have to see what happens. Last year was the first year we did not have a brood raised. The year before there were two, one hen moved in after the first one left with her brood. Also saw a Hooded Merganser hen enter the house. She may have laid an egg. I never got eyes on that brood. There were so many hens around last year I watched one try to get into a bluebird house. 

And due to the Texas blizzard last year, there were no bluebirds in the neighborhood and few in the midwest for that matter. One person who runs a 500 house bluebird trail in Nebraska was said to have less than 10 occupied houses last year. I am not sure if those numbers are completely accurate Still there will probably be few bluebirds this year either, though my sister who lives near St. Louis has them already building nests in her houses. 

Don Grussing 
Minnetonka 
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