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Re: Snakes, Bluebirds, and RAID



Bill -

Yours was a thoughtful, sensitive and realistic response.  we're too often focused
on instant or specific gratification, and our natural world doesn't follow those
rules.  thanks for sharing your wisdom.

Tom Striker
Dunwoody, GA
tstriker@bellsouth.net

BILL HILTON JR. (Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History) wrote:

> CarolinaBirders . . .
>
> I've been wrestling for the past 12 hours or so about how to respond
> to the recent public posting (below) in which a listserv member
> recommended squirting RAID into a bluebird nestbox to drive out a
> snake. In the same posting there was a suggestion that turpentine be
> applied to nestbox posts to keep out fire ants.
>
> My quandary came when I couldn't decide whether to reply to the
> member privately or with a public post. Obviously, I have come down
> on the side of a general note to all, simply because there are
> subscribers who--in their innocence--might follow this person's lead
> in using toxic chemicals to manipulate wildlife.
>
> As a birder and an educator/naturalist, I've spent most of my life
> observing and studying all creatures great and small, as well as the
> flora and habitats that coexist with them. I have a deep appreciation
> for bluebirds and the difficulty we have caused them through
> importing European Starlings and House Sparrows, and by continuing to
> cut down snags with natural hollows that could serve as nesting sites.
>
> I have an equal appreciation for snakes. Although I put up bluebird
> boxes to try to attract bluebirds, local Black Ratsnakes frequently
> do what they do well in climbing poles and removing chicks before
> they can fly. I fully understood when I put up the boxes that snakes
> might visit, so I believe it's not my privilege to legislate whether
> the boxes get used by wrens or flying squirrels or blacksnakes.
>
> I often get calls from folks who complain that their attempts to
> attract wildlife end up bringing in organisms they'd rather not have,
> and my responses are always the same:
> --If you're putting out sunflower seeds to attract chickadees, you're
> also putting out chickadees that will attract Sharp-shinned Hawks. Be
> excited that a predatory bird has honored your yard, and spend some
> time observing this creature as it goes about its business.
> --If you build a garden pond and stock it with goldfish, don't
> complain when a Great Blue Heron shows up to gobble the fish. After
> all, how many folks can brag that they have a heron in their backyard?
> --If you hang out a feeder to attract hummingbirds, you can bet that
> sooner or later you're going to get other things that like to drink
> sugar water, whether it's other birds, or bees, or ants, or yellow
> jackets. If you study the habits of these interlopers, you're likely
> to find a way to satisfy their needs as well as those of the
> hummingbirds.
> --And, to get back to the matter at hand, if you put an artificial
> cavity on a pole in your yard, it's bound to attract the attention of
> things that like to poke around in holes. In that aerial cavities are
> pretty scarce in nature, one solution is to put up more nestboxes in
> places that not every creature can get to.
>
> The most disturbing thing about the RAID posting, of course, is that
> it recommends the use of a chemical that has potential for harm. To
> be honest, I don't know what the direct effect of spraying a snake
> with RAID might be, but it can't be very good-hence the warning
> labels on the aerosol container. I can easily visualize the snake
> slithering rapidly to get away from the RAID and ignoring its usual
> inbred caution, only to be snatched up by a Red-shouldered Hawk that
> takes the RAID-laden snake back as an afternoon snack for the hawk
> nestlings. Who knows what RAID might do when ingested by a
> Red-shouldered Hawk chick?
>
> I don't want to sound sanctimonious, for I am a sinner, too. I often
> commute by bicycle, but I also drive a gasoline vehicle, I'm not a
> vegetarian, and I sometimes buy things that are over-packaged.
> Nonetheless, I've discovered there are plenty of mechanical ways to
> protect goldfish from herons, hummingbird feeders from ants, and
> bluebird chicks from blacksnakes, so I simply can't condone using
> noxious chemicals like RAID and turpentine.
>
> Next time a blacksnake tries to check out your bluebird box, either
> sit there smug and satisfied because you found a way to outsmart the
> snake and prevent its entry, or simply sit and watch as nature's
> predator-prey scenario is acted out once again. Better yet, call in
> all the local kids and next-door neighbors and use the bird-snake
> interaction as a teaching opportunity in the hope that all those
> folks will reach for the RAID a little less often.
>
> Yours for birds and snakes and other living things,
>
> BILL
>
> *********
>
> >Two bluebird boxes recenty checked had snakes in them. In the neighbor's
> >box she looked in and saw the snake, took the box down and tried to shake
> >it out.  Two barely alive chicks fell out but not the snake.  I suggested
> >giving the snake a sqirt of Raid and he gave up and came out.
> >       In the box at our Senior Center I noted that there was no feeding
> >activity so I reached up to feel the nest and what I felt were not eggs.
> >After a second check I slid the nest out and there was a beautiful
> >creature almost 3' long coiled up and pretty much asleep.  The nest was a
> >chickadee or titmouse.
> >       Another bird loving neighbor told me that once snakes enter a bluebird
> >box or a martin house the birds will not use it any more.  Same for fire
> >ants.  An old fashioned remedy is to apply turpentine around the post.
>
> **********
>
> BILL HILTON JR., "The Piedmont Naturalist"
> Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History
> 1432 DeVinney Road
> York, South Carolina 29745
> USA
>
> e-mail: <hilton@hiltonpond.org>
>
> Voice: (803) 684-5852
>
> eFax: (503) 218-0845
>
> Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History is a 501(c)(3)
> non-profit research and education organization, so all in-kind or
> monetary gifts to Operation RubyThroat and the Center are
> tax-deductible. Please visit our websites:
>
> Hilton Pond:  <http://www.hiltonpond.org>
>
> Operation RubyThroat:  <http://www.rubythroat.org>
>
> "Never trust a person too lazy to get up for sunrise or too busy to
> watch the sunset."
>
>                                                 BHjr.
>
> **********