Wiring the owl box

I just put it up and I doubt any self-respecting screech owl will move in.

Not in an owl box 40 feet from a house with a barking dog.

It's not like I had a lot of choices --  the power cord is only 60 feet long.






I attached the cam in the upper left corner of the box.

If anything uses it, I suspect it'll be a giant ninja attack squirrel.

So my challenge, besides getting up into the tree and hanging the thing, was protecting it.




I decided to shield the cam with quarter inch wire mesh, with a hole large enough for the camera's unobstructed view.

Unfortunately, a hole big enough for the camera is also big enough for a squirrel's head.

 

I asked the redhead to standby while I mounted it in the tree.

It was a bear getting it up there.

I strapped it on with bungie cords before bolting it in place.

"You're too old to be climbing trees", she remarked.

"You're right", I replied, "but try to you break my fall, okay?

No response.

"Hey, I'm not ready to be sitting in front of a TV tray with a comforter on my lap straining soup with my mustache."

"That may be", she said, "but don't expect me to break your fall."

You tell me

It was the day before Thanksgiving.

While cutting firewood I had stumbled upon the other three screech owl boxes I had lovingly built, and I started to wonder about the fourth one.

I hadn't checked on it since I hung it up, and this was the condition I found it in.

Would anyone care to reconstruct the story for me based on the visible evidence?

Season finale: squirrel trials update

As we pulled up to the garage yesterday after an absense of 10 days I noticed the security alarm from my owl box was on top of the garbage can. When we left for Virginia it was in the owl box where it signaled the receiver in the house to beep everytime a squirrel got into the box.

There was only one explanation, bear mischief. So we walked around the house and sure enough, there was the evidence. Bruin had torn open my experimental owl box.

Before we left I had shut down the operation and removed the camera trap, but the lingering smell of sunflower seeds in the box was enough to tempt a bear.

A few minutes later my ever vigilant neighbor Richard came put-putting down the driveway on his motor scooter. The bear's break-in happened a couple nights ago, he reported, and he had put the alarm on the garbage can out of the rain.

So the squirrel trials come to an end. I'll fix the owl box, but it's time to put it in storage. Now it's time to begin searching for water shrews and red tree mice.

Squirrel trials update #5

Last Monday we left for the bay area, but before leaving I stocked the owl box with sunflower seeds and made sure the camera trap was working.

Today I checked the camera to catch up.

After I put smooth plywood under the overhang the squirrels visited the box every day. They were stymied by these latest changes. They climbed about on the tree trunk and peered over the edge of the roof.

The deterrents didn't last long. On Tuesday, the first squirrel broke the sheet metal barrier. I regret not having a marked population of squirrels, and not recording the entry in movie mode. But somehow it reached the hole, and pulled itself in, as you can see for yourself.



The next day the same or another squirrel explored the box for 4 minutes and then made a left-handed side entry. Notice that the little bugger is gripping the upper edge of the roof with one hindfoot. The squirrel with the scratched nose did the same thing.



I am going to watch them for a few days to figure out their secret. Then it's back to the drawing board. Spring travel may force me to postpone further experiments until fall. The redhead just isn't very enthusiastic about watching squirrels and tending camera traps in my absense.

Squirrel trials update # 4

Since the last update I extended the roof to 6 inches. I thought the wonder-rodent couldn't do the yogic stretch to reach the hole. When squirrel encountered the modification it looked over the edge, and didn't even try. It snaked around the corner from the side of the roof where the overhang is only 2.5".

Fair enough. I decided to add 5" vertical barriers to the sides.



This seemed to make it even easier. Now the squirrel could oppose the grip of its hindlegs at 90 degrees, and in one swell foop it did the yogic stretch to reach the hole.



Exiting the box is also a cinch. Though the redwood is smooth, the joints on the corners and sides offer the squirrel more than adequate purchase.

It was time to raise the bar, as they say, which in this case meant enlisting Richard's help again. We covered the box with galvanized metal flashing.



You are looking up at the one area that isn't flashed -- the underside of the overhanging roof.

By 11:00 the next morning the remote alarm inside the box had not sounded, and I was starting to think that maybe, just maybe, I had circumvented wonder-rodent.

"Guess, who hasn't gotten into the box today?" I asked the redhead rather smugly. (Her response, "Who?" was a polite admission that she wasn't really listening, a common pattern in the conversation of old couples and Seinfeld characters.)

Ten minutes later the alarm blasted in its irritating way.

A couple hours later I was gazing out the window and finishing a cup of coffee in quiet postprandial reflection, when the squirrel made a second appearance.

It climbed all around the box on the bark of the tree, mounted the roof, and looked over the edge at the hole. Then it rapidly scratched the metal roof as if trying to dig through. After a thoughtful pause, it went back to edge, leaned over the side, and crawled upside down on the exposed woodwork and entered the hole. It was just like a gecko.

This charged me with determination to do it one better. When the squirrel finished its repast 20 minutes later, I removed the roof and took it to the garage. Fifteen minutes later the undersurface of the roof was one smooth piece of plywood.



Stay tuned.

Squirrel trials update #3

This is a progress report. We haven't yet solved the squirrel-in-the-owl-box-problem. But I believe we are getting closer.

The squirrels aren't early birds. Usually I hear the alarm between 9:00 and 10:00 AM and dash to the window to see what's going on. By then the squirrel is in the owl box. The regulars seem to be young of last year, perhaps siblings.

Since my last report they visited and fed in the open-topped box for a week. Then I put the roof back on, and they had to get past the overhang of 2.5".

As expected, there was no contest. They just hang over the front and enter.

After a week of regular morning visits I extended the length of the overhand from 2.5" to 6.75". Again, they didn't miss a beat. Their rotational ankles make it easy to cling to the front edge of the box and reach the entrance.

This afternoon I extended the roof to 9". The squirrels will have to span 11" to reach the hole from the front edge of the roof.

I expect they'll start coming in from the side, where the straight line distance to the hole is 6.75".

I just hope they don't lose their appetite for sunflower seeds, so we can finish the trials in the next two weeks.

Oh yes, something else is going on, too. Yesterday's squirrel had a bloody patch of skin on one side of its face, and this morning another squirrel showed up with a bloody snout. Has mom become a pre-partum crankinpuss, and is she kicking butt when last year's litter shows up in the nest? I wonder.

Owl box finished

The weather was ideal for hanging owl boxes this week. Visibility in the woods is still good -- the gooseberries are just leafing out, but the poison oak thickets are still dormant. Plus, the air is delicately scented with bay flowers.

Maybe it's a little late to hang owl boxes, but it feels good to have finally finished the project. One has a 2.5" hole (to favor saw whet owls), and the other has a 3" hole (for screechers). The latter can accomodate a camera module.

It was easy enough to cut and assemble the owl boxes. I had all materials on hand. (I'm cheap and used recycled redwood and hardware).



The only expense was the galvanized flashing needed for squirrel proofing. You have to cut and apply the flashing, but that's not a problem when your neighbor's mantra is "The guy who dies with the most tools wins". Richard has a sheet metal break and an pneumatic stapler, and that made the job easier.

Covering sacred redwood with flashing seems like a crime, but it's bearable if it defeats homesteading by 'wathcally sqouyals'.

Of course, the flashing makes your box look as ugly as a hemorrhoid. It glares like a beacon in the afternoon sun. And who knows -- maybe it reflects wave lengths that attract bees looking for prospective hives. So you have to paint the metal (and treat it with vinegar so the paint sticks).



And then there are the finishing touches, like the internal owl ladder or perch (see below), drainage holes, and a layer of clean sawdust or wood shavings.



I settled for a small grove of Douglas firs for the screech owl box and pruned a clear flight path to the box. It's about 25 feet up on the NW side.

The branches make it easy to climb up to the box, but I'm thinking I should take the chain saw and cut them off this weekend. A bear could climb the tree with or without branches, but why make it easy?

Squirrel trials update #2

They're very tricky those squirrels. At the moment they are not cooperating.

The day before yesterday I installed a remote passive infrared (PIR) surveillance alarm in the roof of the owl box under a wire mesh cage. Now the alarm will alert the codger when it is time for squirrel observation.

It works nicely. The infrared detector sends a signal from the box to the receiver in the house which produces a maddening 2-tone alarm. There 's a little red light on the transmitter so you can perform a "walk test".



Yesterday morning the alarm sounded briefly on two occasions between 9:00 and 10:00. Though the box was filled with sunflower seed, the squirrels immediately withdrew. I suspect they heard the alarm through the walls of the house (yes, even I can hear it from out there) or they didn't like the red light blinking on the detector.

Wouldn't it be nice if a blinking red light was all it took to keep squirrels out of owl boxes? Well, I'm not buying it. When they are ready or hungry enough the squirrels will be back.

However, the experiment must continue without delay. Late yesterday I covered the light with electrician's tape, but no squirrels have entered the box today.

I'm going to remove the roof of the box to make the food inside more inviting. We need a population of highly motivated squirrels if we are going to solve this problem.

In the meanwhile we are getting our daily exercise shoveling snow and chopping ice. We've been snowed in for two weeks now, and it's time to buy supplies (like food!).

Squirrel trials update #1

This is an image that strikes terror into the hearts of owl boxers. Imagine how a screech owl feels with this peering into its home.

Yesterday I replaced the front of the experimental owl box with one having a larger (3.5") hole. The 3" hole seemed a little small and I didn't want to invite home renovation by a squirrel.

The box still contained a lot of sunflower seeds but it was filled with icy snow. Since there's precipitation in the forecast I put a lid on it.

This morning, the squirrels didn't show until 11:00, and the following clockwise sequence shows the reaction of one of them to the owl box modification.



This series assured me that there was no need to worry that a lid would discourage them and delay the experiment. Once the hole was located the squirrel wasted no time entering and feeding on and off for a half hour.

It had a room with a view and periodically surveyed its surroundings, as if to say:

"Hey dudes, this is a gnarly place with all kinds of awesome snacks."

The squirrel trials begin

Owlman recently ran a squirrel out of his squirrel-proof screech owl box. When seen on the video monitor the rodent was comfortably ensconced and showing a morbid curiosity in the video camera which happens to be the size of a walnut. This is a scary thing to see on one's owl cam.

I am finishing up a couple of nest boxes for small owls. It's cold working in the garage, but it has been a nice break from home bound routines and shoveling snow. I'm using redwood siding and shelves from the pantry of a 100-year-old house in Santa Cruz. That scaly old paint is rough on the planer blades, but the planed wood is old growth, wonderful to see, touch and smell.

I was California groovin' in the garage -- planing, sawing, thinking about owls, giant redwoods, old saw mills, and the pleasures of free recycled timber, but bothersome visions interrupted my reverie. I saw a squirrel contortionist stretching like a leech to reach the entrance hole . . . a squirrel scaling an impossible expanse of metal flashing like a gecko . . . a squirrel chewing away at the entrance hole, ousting the resident owl, and looking out the misshapen hole with bug-eyed self-satisfaction.

Then the idea came to me. Why not make an experimental owl box and use it to test various squirrel deterrents?

If you have seen the British documentary "Daylight Robbery" you will get my drift. The script was so imaginative, the sound track so cleverly playful, and Dr. Jessica Holm so charming that it inspired a new wave of backyard squirrel research and wholesome campus recreation like squirrel fishing.

Daylight Robbery was actually a celebration of the eastern gray squirrel's problem solving ability, namely in circumventing obstacles and deterrents to the bird feeders. Last year it inspired me to embark on a similar exploration of climbing abilities in a dusky-footed wood rat .

Now I must train the local squirrels to feed in the roofless owl box and test their intrusion skills when the roof is in place. When they're hooked on the early bird special (black sunflower seeds and peanuts) the performance trials will begin. I'll systematically evaluate the deterrent effect of different sized roofs, flashing, hole position, baffles and so on.



Yesterday I set up the roofless owl box and a camera trap, and at 8:00 this morning two small squirrels were on the scene. Neither entered the box, but they perched on it and ate the seeds I left on the edges.

I didn't bother to check the camera for pictures of the first visit, but rest assured it's ready for tomorrow.

Ne me quitte pas

Despite my best intentions, the screech owl flew the coop. I checked the camera trap today. My rude intrusion was just too much.

This picture was taken at 5:17PM on the same day of my owl debacle. There were two photos of the owl. Obviously it was ready to "get the hell out of Dodge". That was it.

Knowing that the owl was gone, I checked out the box. I had been right. The bad smell was from squirrels. There were bones and baby squirrel fur in the box. Something must have bumped off the mother. No barf balls were to be found.

I find it curious that the owls ignore the flash when they are nesting. The camera trap took hundreds of flash photos last spring when a pair of screech owls nested in a tree cavity not far from here. It seems that once committed, they stick it out despite the camera flash.

It's a let down. The owl box (sigh) is close enough to the house for an owl cam, and I was ready to set one up courtesy of neighbor Richard who loaned the equipment.

I'm not giving up. I went to the hardware store this afternoon. It's time to build some more owl boxes.

Knock knock?

My task today was to move the screech owl box. The stimulus was Owlman's recent post at The Owl Box Blog.

My owl box has been in the same place for two years. If two years pass and an owl doesn't stake its claim the owl pundits advise you to move the box to a new location. A squirrel staked its claim the first year and installed a grass nest with an arched roof.

When we passed the box this morning I threw a rock at it...bonk!

"See? No owl! If there was a screech owl inside, it would be looking out and wondering what the hell is going on." The redhead remained silent, which means she accepted the wisdom of my statement or wasn't listening.

After lunch I climbed the ladder, removed the 2 bunji cords, and clasping the box to my chest started to climb down the ladder. Halfway down I paused to pluck a few gray squirrel hairs from the gnawed entrance.

Yes, I pondered, it was a squirrel, and now it's eviction time.

Noticing that the grass nest was gone, I stuck my nose in the hole and sniffed . . . . the box gave off a sweet fetid odor. Now that's disgusting, I thought. This damn squirrel must be deranged to crap in its nest.

I tipped the box toward the sunlight and looked in the hole . . . and . . . GREAT BALLS OF FIRE!

There was a screech owl inside! It was leaning sideways with one half-opened eye and half-raised ear tufts. It looked like Britney Spears on a bad hair day after a weeklong boogie fest. Of course, the smell wasn't squirrel doodoo. It was the unmistakable stench of an owl's sour barf balls.

"Oh my God. This is an emergency!" I had to get that box back in the tree pronto, and for that I needed the redhead's assistance, immediately.

I stuffed my jacket in the hole, and fetched the redhead, who was about to go to our daughter's house.



"This is an emergency." I pleaded. "If the Fish and Wildife Service finds out I molested the owl, I could go to jail!" The redhead joined me.

We got the box back up, and an hour later I set up a camera trap. It was a rough day.

I hope this owl can forgive and forget.