Who would have thought pieces from TP holders would look so great on a birdhouse? lol! I love all three of them. Great idea using the picture frame for trim! You see frames so cheap at thrift stores and rummage sales and they are usually missing the glass and backs. This is a great way to repurpose them. TFS your wonderful ideas!

Gibby, house wrens and house sparrows are entirely different species. House sparrows are a non-native bird and are considered pests by many, thus are not protected by law. House wrens are native birds and it is illegal to tamper with their nests. I do not allow house wrens to nest in my boxes, however, because as you said they are can cause harm to the eggs and hatchlings of other cavity nesters. I remove any sticks I find in my nestboxes and, fortunately, have not come upon a completed house wren nest (or else I'd have to leave it alone). Since I monitor my nestboxes twice each week during nesting season I can usually catch early nesting attempts by wrens and stop them. You can find out more about both species at this link: www.sialis.org Kathy

The magic halo works for the first week or so until they get used to it and brave enough to ignore it. My HOSP use it to swing on and land on the short perches I use. They also swing on it back and forth to get the seeds out of the feeder without having to actually land on the perches. It does seem to keep the numbers down as some are wary of it and it does seem to hinder them somewhat, but I have lots of HOSP and they will try anything.

Hi Konrad, Kinda sad to lose your RBNH nest... but this is nature at work I guess. Yes, we lost 1 bluebird egg to a HOWR 2 seasons ago. We saw him fly to and into the nest box, and come out with the pierced egg still impaled on his beak! We were waving our arms and shouting at him, as he dropped it on the ground and flew off. It all happened in 30 seconds or less. We discouraged him with a squirt gun for days and the parent blues dived bombed him mercilessly whenever he came near. He finally stopped coming around, and I'm happy to say the other 3 eggs hatched and fledged successfully. Hope your Nuthatches try again for you, Kenn Here is a link that might be useful: Latest Slideshow