This One’s For The Birds Workshop Offers Lessons In Birdhouse Building, Advice On Habitats

For Tom Richards, the first stab at building a birdhouse was a crash course.

The nails he used to attach it to the support stick weren’t adequate and “the birdhouse just fell off the stick. I went out and it was lying on the ground. And there were birds in there,” Richards said Saturday.

No harm came to the baby chickadees.

“The mom had flipped the nest over, and they were fine.”

Now, he uses screws for the critical attachment.

Richards, manager of Atlas Building Center, was sharing his experiences with folks who were pounding away on birdhouses. At a special event, he invited the Audubon Society and Idaho Fish and Game to share advice, too. Wild Birds Unlimited, another store, showed up to hand out information.

It was fun with a serious purpose. Loss of natural habitat to development makes birdhouses more than back yard entertainment.

“Sad to say, there are fewer birds,” said Roger Young, explaining that Audubon members have documented dropping numbers during a monitoring project near Lake Coeur d’Alene.

People of all ages crowded around while Young discussed the birdhouses he’d built, including a huge one for wood ducks.

“Unlike other birds, the wood ducks fly right into the house. They fold their wings and fly into that little hole.”

The size of the hole is crucial, Young said. Make it larger than the kind of bird you want to attract, and larger species will muscle the little guys out.

“The next most important thing is to put the birdhouses together in a way that you can clean them,” Young said. A sliding floor or door, or screw-on roof, will do the trick.

Some birds will turn up their beaks at an unkempt birdhouse. And an unclean house can spread germs, Young said.

There was information available for building all kinds of houses, for bats and bluebirds, geese and owls.

The event will be repeated next Saturday, and at the March 20-22 Coeur d’Alene home and garden show. For $5.95, visitors get the materials and advice to build a birdhouse. Or they can pay nothing, and donate their creation to Audubon’s bird habitat project at Mica Bay.

There’s also a contest, to be judged March 20.

“Audubon will pick the house that’s best for birds, and our customers will pick the one they think is prettiest,” Richards said.

The contest is for people who want to do something fancier than the quickie birdhouses that were being hammered together Saturday. Not that there was any lack of enthusiasm.

Four-year-old Ben Deremiah watched avidly as his family’s birdhouse took shape. His eyes were at tabletop level and nearly as big as the safety goggles he wore.

The birdhouse, he proclaimed, was going “on the front porch.”

Who was going to nail it together?

In reply, Ben poked a thumb at his chest.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: A BETTER BIRDHOUSE The birdhouse event will be repeated next Saturday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Atlas Building Center, at Kathleen Avenue and U.S. 95 in Coeur d’Alene. For $5.95, visitors get the materials and advice to build a birdhouse, or they can pay nothing, and donate their creation to the Audubon Society. There also will be a workshop at the March 20-22 Coeur d’Alene home and garden show.