Tim, sounds like my house. I have 3 boxes. I put fishing line on a box that some HOSP had started building a nest in. I took the nesting material out and opened the box for awhile. This happened about a month ago. I closed the box and put fishing wire near the entrance hole. HOSP didn't like that and they seemed to have gone away. Today they are back building a nest, fishing wire and all. I opened the box, took out the nesting material to deter them. My blues have already started laying eggs in another box. There are 3 eggs now. . One HOSP landed on that box. The blues chased them away. Then One HOSP landed on the other box (empty box) blues chased them away from that box. I will have to keep an eye on everything. I live on a golf course. My yard is fairly large, but not too large that I can't see comings and goings. I don't have fish wire on the other two boxes. May have to put some on the box the eggs are in and see if that will work. Hope it won't disturb the blues too much.

Tim! You can fashion a spooker out of the skinny wooden dowels at the hardware store, you'll need cable ties or duct tape to put them into the "T" position and then duct tape the mylar streamers. If your boxes are wooden you can screw in two little eye hooks or something to the back of the box then cable tie the dowel to the box. If you make them like that you'll have spookers for every box and you only have to keep buying the mylar banners from the dollar store. Like Nicknack said they need to come down right after fledging so these b******s don't become tolerant. Cable tie or duct tape something to the tres box temporarily till you get situated. Right know my spookers are all gunked together due to the rain which makes me real paranoid. Yesterday I ran down my driveway in the rain like a wild beast 'cause I swore there was hosp intrusion at a box but it was just tres relatives going in the box causing a ruckus. I'll relax when the wind dries out the streamers and they unfurl. Good luck Tim, Sue

Thanks again Kendra, Sue, etc. I REALLY want to put the DRST back out but I'm worried there won't be a good enough place where it'll be hidden, and not attract predators like Hawks and Raccoons which could get my bluebirds. I heard HOSP nestlings on this woman's property. They nest in her pine trees. I have 3 properties under control from HOSP. This is the ONE area they are coming from. Her husband suggested if I do it, to do it away from them. Oh the irony!! That's where the HOSP are coming from to begin with! Guess you can't win em all. Luckily they sold the alpacas they had...one time before they said there were birds in there, sparrows, but they didn't stop them I don't believe. So they were probably multiplying more back then. The barns they were in have been closed since last fall. Previously there were HOSP and Starlings in them. So, really, how vulnerable are juvenile HOSP to the DRST?! Does anyone think I'd have a good chance of trapping them after fledging? Unfortunately I can't rip their nests from the trees like I do with the other neighbor's. The 3 plots are the one I rent, the landlords' where my bluebirds are, and the 3rd is where the martin housing is. adjacent is her property. Confusing, I know. Try to be vigilant with this youngster ^^

Tim, I am so sorry this has happened. This is the third incidence this season that I have heard of a HOSP going in a nestbox with a spooker attached. I have no clue what the other spookers look liked but what does yours look like? Does it have the dowels that come over the roof of the box with streamers hanging down touching the roof of the nestbox all the way from the back to the front of the nestbox? Do you have two dowels coming out over it or just one? That is the only thing I can think of is that the spooker wasn't as scary as it should be. However....HOSP seem to be really bad this year all over the US. I am having way more of them interested in nestboxes than usual this year and so are many others. I am worried about a pair of TRES right now that haven't started laying eggs yet. A HOSP pair is hanging around them...this is at a park where I have a small trail. I have trapped five down there this Spring already.