People and Purple Martins: A History of Help

Purple Martins are the largest swallow in North America. They spend our winter in South America and fly north in early February to breed in North America. Austin is located within their breeding range.

The animation below shows where the birds are during the course of a year.

Today, east of the Rocky Mountains, martins nest nearly exclusively in human-supplied housing.

For thousands of years, martins nested in natural cavities and dead trees. Over time, they have come to associate human activity with safety. Native Americans hung gourds with holes cut in their sides so the martins would nest near their villages. This arrangement benefitted both humans and birds. Purple Martins acted like scarecrows, chasing crows from corn patches and vultures from drying meat and animal hides, while humans discouraged predators from raiding martin nests.

In modern-day Austin, many individuals and neighborhood groups maintain martin colonies, including Travis Audubon. Members of our Purple Martin Committee serve as “landlords” for thirteen nest colonies, from Hornsby Bend to Mills Pond. Cumulatively, our nest colonies have produced 1,944 eggs, 1,125 nestlings, and over 900 fledglings this season!

Protecting Colonies and Roosts

When Purple Martins arrive in Austin in the spring, they form nest colonies. They rear their young in the light-colored plastic gourds that you might have seen around town. During the nest season, the Purple Martin colonies are susceptible to all sorts of predators—snakes, raccoons, and even other birds, like the non-native House Sparrows and European Starlings that try to take over  the gourds for their own nesting efforts. Our Purple Martin Committee installs predator guards and monitors the nests weekly to address issues and give young martins the best chance of survival.

After babies fledge, or acquire the necessary feathers to fly and leave the gourd, the birds move from the nesting colony to large, communal roosts. They sleep at the roosts as they prepare for their southbound migration and as they migrate south. Austin has a major roost site where hundreds of thousands of birds gather each summer beginning in mid to late June through late August or early September. As the birds come in to roost each night, they swirl around in huge clouds and put on a spectacular show! This is where we host our Purple Martin Parties.

This roost site, in an open urban setting, provides safety from predators. However, the roost is often in a shopping center, filled with windows that can look deceptively clear to a martin’s eye. Once the martins are at the roost, the Purple Martin Committee patrols the area each morning to find injured or deceased birds that may have collided with a window. Purple Martins in need of medical attention are delicately captured and taken to a wildlife rehabilitation facility.

A Multi-faceted Committee

Some of our Purple Martin Committee landlords have been landlords for many years and are experts in all that it takes to establish a nesting colony and to address various issues that can arise during a nest season. Our experts regularly mentor newer landlords and advise people who are interested in possibly providing a nest colony for martins. If you are interested in learning more about providing a colony, reach out to Travis Audubon.

Other members of the committee focus on educating the public about the life history of Purple Martins through community presentations and by volunteering at the Purple Martin Parties to answer questions and engage with party attendees.

Roost volunteers monitor the roost, rescuing injured birds and encouraging business owners to allow us to apply window decals to make their windows visible to the birds.

Since bird conservation is a prime objective for Travis Audubon, we have recently added a research component to our Purple Martin work by banding nestling Purple Martins. Banding birds is the process of marking individuals so they can be identified and monitored by observers. The data collected from monitoring efforts is used to answer questions about the species.

 

Why Martins Matter

Like any bird, Purple Martins are beautiful, interesting, and an integral part of the ecosystems they touch. As insectivores, they play an especially important role in keeping insect populations in check, especially those of crop pests. According to the Purple Martin Conservation Association, Purple Martins eat over 250 billion insects each year. The birds are also graceful flyers and beautiful singers. Many people report feeling a sense of happiness when watching and listening to martins, a welcome respite from the challenges of everyday life.

While Purple Martins are listed as a “Species of Least Concern,” population trends point to a darker picture. Purple Martin populations have declined by 24.1% over the last 55 years. Locally, Purple Martin abundance within the greater Austin area decreased between 2012 and 2022, with an average -8.6% decline in the 268 square miles surrounding Austin. The Trends Map from eBird below illustrates the importance of providing habitat for the Purple Martins in our neighborhood.

Purple Martins offer a unique opportunity to make an impact for birds. They rely on human-provided nesting sites in much of the United States, so those cute gourd racks you see around town are having a tangible impact on conservation. Future generations of Purple Martins are counting on us. If we want to continue to watch their aerial acrobatics, we need to act.

Your donation to Travis Audubon’s Purple Martin Committee funds habitat, education, and research. We’re combining bird banding, boots-on-the-ground conservation, and community outreach to make Central Texas a safe summer home for Purple Martins.