We have spent most of the rainy weekend watching and photographing the birds on the Jelly Porch. I counted the pair of House Wrens, 5 different Baltimore Orioles, a pair of Cardinals and of course the many hummingbirds at their feeder. I almost forgot the pair of House Finches who have joined the group that likes grape jelly. It is fun to watch how each behaves. I don't know if the wrens are choosing this nest(I placed a gourd house up high in the corner) or another somewhere else. They aren't here daily, but always return. They are very mean to the other birds. The male orioles are mean to the juvenile males. The female redbird is more adventurous than the timid male and comes directly to the jelly; he hesitates a few times before flying down. The bluebirds have nested in the martin house; no martins this year; also in another blue bird house. A pair of Brown Thrashers have returned for several years to the east side yard and I am sure nest there someplace. I have begun seeing the gorgeous Blue Buntings this week both at the seed feeder and ground feeding. Lots to watch.

I live in a suburban type neighborhood but with houses on only one side of the street. Accross the street from me is a big (16 acre) open park and directly next to the park is another heavily wooded area which is a county nature preserve. My neighbors have the typical no garden landscape but here I have planted heavily in fruiting shrubs like viburnum, serviceberry, shrub dogwoods, Winterberry, blueberries, and many others that attract backyard songbirds. I have no bluebirds and no tree sparrows have ever come to my nestboxes although I do see them flying overhead. Although I have had the male wren building fake nests for 4 years, last year was the first year he found a mate and they fledged two broods. That year the chicadees were nesting less than 20 feet away from the wrens. They never bothered each other. This year the wren is nesting in the front yard in a slotbox house that is very near my blackberries. The chicadees are in the backyard in a box very near my old cherry tree. The nestboxes are not in sight of each other but really they are not that far from each other either as I do not have a huge yard. House wrens apprear to be rare here. It was years of me planting shrubs to make the yard more attractive to sonbirds before I ever saw a wren here. I know that this is not a polular opinion here on the bluebird forum but I really like the house wrens.

If I were you I would put up the other box out of site of the Chickadee box. Also if there are eggs in the dees nest add a 1 1/8" hole reducer so a Bluebird can't get in. Blues usually don't tolerate nesting next to Dees for some reason. I have many paired boxes, had them paired at 15 feet apart for two years and nothing would let another bird nest that close to it. Moved them to 25-30 feet apart and the TRES and BLues nest together happily at that distance. TRES and Dees can nest that close together too but not sure about BLues and Dees. Good luck!

Perhaps you could put up a second house somewhere near just like the first and give them an alternative. I've had good luck with this when I get birds battling over a box. Of course that's a slippery slope and why I have so many bird houses. Maybe you shouldn't listen to me.