1998 PMCA Landlord of the Year
Reprinted from: Purple Martin Update 9(1)
Louise Chambers
Purple Martin Conservation Association
Reprinted from: Purple Martin Update 9(1)
Louise Chambers
Purple Martin Conservation Association
The PMCA is pleased to introduce its 1998 Landlord of the Year, Kent Justus. Using today's computer technology to share information and ideas, he created a web site, Purple Martin Headquarters <http://www3.vantek.net/pmh>, that in turn hosts the Purple Martin Forum <http://www3.vantek.net/pmh/forum>, a discussion-oriented site that has reached many thousands of would-be and active Purple Martin landlords. The Forum focuses on education and enjoyment of martins to help landlords have greater success in managing their colony sites, and to share their experiences with other landlords. The Forum functions both as a message board and discussion group, soliciting an exchange of information between beginners, experts, and all those landlords in between. A variety of questions and answers are posted, covering issues from the most basic (i.e., How can I tell a Purple Martin from a Tree Swallow?), to the latest ideas in housing and management innovations, such as fine-tuning starling-resistant entrance holes. The Forum also presents landlord profiles, original articles, and reprints of articles from other publications, as well as including exchanges of support and encouragement. Instant accessibility from anywhere in the world to every type of information imaginable has made the Forum a "one-stop shopping trip" for everything from where to buy various items, to when to put up housing, and how to deal with all types of situations during the nesting season. If you have not visited this site yet, we encourage you to do so soon. You'll find a very friendly and encouraging group of landlords and martin fans all willing to share their knowledge, their successes and their failures.
A resident of Little Rock, Arkansas, Kent is a Telecommunications Supervisor with Alltel Communications, Inc., working with 800 inbound service and Interactive Voice Response technology. He currently manages four colony sites, one at his parents' home, one at his grandmother's, one at a church and one at his own home. These four sites contain of a grand total of 260 cavities, consisting of 212 gourds, and four Trio houses, two of which have been modified. Besides martins, Kent's interests include singing in church, playing the piano, painting, boating, water-skiing, playing basketball and tennis, and building bluebird boxes. Traveling throughout North America to see new birds and enjoy the scenery also rank high on his list.
There is no doubt that e-mail and the growing number of personal computers in use, along with the Internet and World Wide Web, have created a revolution in how information is gathered and shared. Here at the PMCA, we first became aware of a landlord named Kent Justus in 1994 when he sent us a photo the local paper had taken of his colony site (see page 8). The photo was eye-catching because every gourd in the photo had a martin clinging to the front. We included that photo in Update 5(4) and later printed articles by Kent in Updates 7(2) "Protecting Gourd-Nesting Martins from Aerial Predators:" 7(3) "The Mississippi Kite: Purple Martins Are Being Included in This Aerial Hunter's Diet"; and 8(2) "Purple Martins Are Flying High in Cyberspace." As these titles suggest, Kent has a particular interest in observing and recording Purple Martin behavior and in using the Internet to promote interest in them.
We asked Kent how the idea of the Forum came about; here's what he had to say: "In November of 1996, I bought a personal computer for my home and was excited to find a few web sites and other on-line information on Purple Martins. However, while there were a couple of informational Purple Martin forums already in existence, I didn't feel that open discussion between the participants was acceptable. I felt that an Internet site that combined a true discussion area for martin enthusiasts, along with a vehicle to disseminate accurate Purple Martin information, was missing. Therefore, I created a discussion web site called 'The Purple Martin Forum' and published it to the World Wide Web in January of 1998, the first web site of its kind available to everyone with Internet access. The purpose of the Forum is to provide a place where all martin enthusiasts with Internet access can gather to share ideas, successes, failures, and at the same time learn a great deal about Purple Martins through informational articles that are uploaded on a regular basis. Personally, I have found that the true reward of the Forum is seeing the friendships that are developing between the participants, and also the satisfaction of knowing that I have provided a site on the Internet where people can get an accurate answer to any question they might have about Purple Martins."
Kent Justus' earliest memories of Purple Martins come from visits to relatives in Sheridan, AR. He remembers playing in the back yard, and when evening came his aunt and uncle would say, "Come out back and let's watch the martins come in." They would sit in the grass and watch a colony of perhaps 16 pairs slowly gather and then swoop in to roost in the wooden martin house. He became fascinated with the birds at that point. Later, when he wanted a martin house of his own, his father, who shares a love of birds and animals with Kent, bought him a Trio M6-K martin house. His interest continued, leading him to earn a Biology degree from the University of Arkansas. Kent's account of his first experience with being a landlord follows, taken from his web site, Purple Martin Headquarters.
"Martin Mania" began for me in 1978. I was 15 years old and my dad bought me a Trio M6-K martin house from a local hardware store. It had only six compartments and my dad and I hoisted it on a tall steel pole. The next morning as I was eating breakfast, I heard the song of a bird. It sounded so happy and excited. I had never heard that song before. I looked out of the window and, to my utter amazement, there on top of my brand new martin house sat a black bird. A beautiful bird. It couldn't be ... it MUST be ... it was an adult male Purple Martin. I shouted to my parents, 'there is a martin on my bird house!' as I ran from the house. My sudden appearance in the back yard startled the martin and he took flight. He soared high into the sky, singing all the while. Then he turned and folded his wings and fell like an arrow back toward the earth and to his new home. How graceful he was. How awe inspiring was his swiftness! I was thrilled. Soon, a female martin joined him and they successfully nested and raised their family."
"That six-hole house was the only accommodations I provided for the martins for the next several years. I remember one year I had taken the house down for cleaning and did not have it back up in place when the first martins returned. The martin flew in the air to the exact spot where the house had been and circled around in confusion, scolding me for not having his home ready after his long migration. I had read where martins would do this, but now I witnessed this behavior for myself. I quickly put his home back in its place and then he landed on it with much celebration."
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| Kent stands in front of a lowered gourd rack, comparing the jumbo-sized natural gourds he uses now (right) to the ostrich-egg sized gourds he first used for his martins (left). The gourd rack has been equipped with wire baffles to deter owl predation. The idea behind the baffles is to interfere with the air space where an owl would normally hover to pluck martins from the gourds. No signs of owl predation have been detected since the baffles were added to the gourd rack. |
Kent acknowledges the many different sources he has learned from over the years: "including the writings of J. L. Wade, A. C. Bent, James R. Hill, III, Dr. Eugene S. Morton, R. B. Layton, Dr. Charles R. Brown, and others too numerous to mention. I would like to thank these individuals for their love and dedication to the study of Purple Martins and for sharing their findings with others through their literary works. However, I can honestly say that I have learned more about Purple Martins from constantly observing and interacting with my own colony for many years than I have from all of the literature I have read on them. My sanity has even been questioned at times because I have literally sat for several hours at a time watching them. You can learn so much just by stopping and observing your martins. I encourage everyone to take notes and keep a yearly diary of activity at their colony."
We asked Kent what improvements he has found to be most worthwhile at the sites he manages. He said that staggering the arms and entrance holes on his gourd racks, to reduce nest-site competition among the martins, has promoted rapid colony growth, and he places the same gourds in the same location each year, with entrance holes oriented consistently from year to year. He also has predator guards on all poles, starling-resistant entrances and 2" x 4" hardware cloth guards on the Trio Castle, and owl guards and wire baffles on his gourd racks. Since installing the owl guards on the gourd racks, he has not noticed any evidence of successful owl attacks. Kent always provides a premade nest of pine needles or straw in each compartment before the martins return each spring. Supplying a premade nest cuts down on the time and energy the martins expend in nest building, and allows them to be less stressed when mating and egg-laying. It also limits the amount of time the martins have to spend on the ground, during which they are at greater risk of being caught by predators. He experimented with horizontally-hung gourds, but later abandoned the practice due to the high numbers of starlings that were drawn to them.
We asked Kent to comment on his particular areas of interest in Purple Martin and swallow studies, and his goals for the future. "Ever since I became interested in studying Purple Martins and all members of the swallow family over 20 years ago, I find that I am particularly interested in the interspecific behavior between martins and their diurnal aerial predators, the accipiter hawks and small falcons. I am intrigued by the differences of flight capabilities between martins and these predators, and have studied their interactions to a great extent. In fact, I would describe my passion for studying swallows over the years as an obsession. I also annually observe and study the attacks of Mississippi Kites (Ictinia mississippiensis) on the martin fledglings at my colony site and hope to document this behavior on videotape this year."
"My goals for the future in the Purple Martin interest are to help those just getting started to do things the right way from the very beginning. I want to continue using my Internet web sites as educational tools that will allow me to reach out to others and share my experience. I had to learn many things the hard way over the years through trial and error, and I want to help people avoid the mistakes that I made and help to pave the wave for their quick success. I also want to travel to Brazil someday to study the wintering behavior of Purple Martins, and to Central America to study the Purple Martin's close relative, the Gray-breasted martin (Progne chalybea)."
Kent Justus is the PMCA's seventh Landlord of the Year honoree. As with all his predecessors, a focus on education, a commitment to help others, and a passionate interest in Purple Martins and their future, mark Kent as highly deserving of this award, and it is our privilege to honor him here. Thanks, Kent, for all you're doing to help martins and martin landlords.
