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High-rise House Martins

house martin high-rise homes

house martin high-rise homes


a pair of house martins on their nest

a pair of house martins on their nest

Walking in Geneva with DweezelJazz recently, near to Carouge, we were surprised to find these House Martins nesting under a ledge on an apartment block. It took me a moment to realise that these were no ordinary nests, constructed from mud. Oh no, these are made from steel!

Now I do know that birds can use tools, and that they can invent them as well. There’s Betty, a New Caledonian Crow, who is famous for having figured out how to bend wire into hooks to retrieve food. You can see that in a youtube video of her exploits.

Jasmine playing with a bolt

Jasmine playing with a bolt

Then there’s Jasmine, our African Grey, who was also very adept at undoing nuts and bolts. She even tried to re-assemble them after taking them apart, and came very close to doing so more than once. However, unless these House Martins have learned how to use power-tools, I rather suspect these nests were provided for them by some kind soul. Whoever it was, in my opinion, you deserve a medal.

The birds clearly approve too, these nests are very well-used. In the few minutes we spent watching them, most of them had someone come or go at least once. The shelf underneath the nests is also a good idea, people passing by can do so without having to worry about what might fall on them.

Good for you, Geneva!

house martin feeding chicks

house martin feeding chicks

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Posted by Tony on Friday, July 31st, 2009 at 20:12 in Jasmine, African Grey, Birds. You can follow any responses to this entry here via RSS 2.0. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

2 Responses to “High-rise House Martins”

  1. Rob Cue Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 17:30

    Hi Tony

    A really great post – I keep on finding gems on your blog.

    We tried a similar thing here in the UK using a synthetic clay ‘nest’ bolted up in the eaves of the house.

    The objective was to try and encourage the house martins not to nest above our back door.

    It kind of worked because the HM’s built their nest directly alongside the prebuilt one.

    I guess they like the challenge of building rather than just occupying one. :)

    Rob

  2. Tony Says:
    April 6th, 2011 at 09:44

    Hi Rob,

    I guess choosing a home is as serious a task for house martins as it is for us humans! I read somewhere that they are very gregarious, so perhaps just seeing the nest you put up led them to believe it was a good neighbourhood in which to raise a family.

    I don’t have any house martins nesting on my home, much as I’d love to see some. However, I can fully understand you not wanting them to nest above your back door!

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