Quaking Aspen Loc: Cottage Grove, OR

Is this birdhouse wars?

We have a number of birdhouses sized for swallows and other birds that size. For the past several years we have had one family of Green-Violet swallows fledge a brood and I had hopes that other families would elect to move into the neighborhood.

This spring a bluebird couple showed up and we were excited to see them. But they began harassing the two swallow families in an apparent effort to drive them away. I would never have thought that bluebirds would be so aggressive.

Have any of you birders out there seen this type of behavior with bluebirds, or any other birds? I built the birdhouses to the proper specs as far as hole size and all that goes, and there are birdhouses going empty because this one bluebird family seems to want it all.

2017 brood being fed

2017 brood being fed

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this years tenant

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New family on the block

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This is MY house!

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Muddyvalley Loc: McMinnville, Oregon

To the best of my knowledge you can place swallow boxes fairly close together. Bluebirds are territorial & blue bird boxes need to have some distance between them. This may have something to do with your problem. I'd wait & see what happens. They will figure it out.

Quaking Aspen Loc: Cottage Grove, OR

Thanks for the reply. I'll wait until after fledging season is over to try any rearrangement of the birdhouses.