From a section of a rotten tree…
OK, I have to be honest, the title of this post is a little misleading because I didn’t actually make this particular nest box; the woodpecker did! (I’ll give you a tip later though for yours). Let me tell you the story. Last week we had some unusually windy days and on the final stormy day a pair of old rotten trees blew down over the stream at the bottom of the garden. One of these trees was our ‘woodpecker’ tree. An old, long dead tree with several nests inside it.
This year the main nest hole was occupied with starlings, (I just hope they were just big enough to survive the fall. I certainly didn’t find any occupants when I went down the next day). So, what to do with a tree that’s really too rotten to turn into firewood?
Then I had the idea of cutting out the nest sections and hanging them up just like regular nest boxes, brilliant! The rest of the tree can be stacked on the side of the stream to rot down into bug food. All the better for the chickens to forage amongst.
I made the top cut at a slight downwards angle and nailed some felt on the top to keep the worst of the rain off. I then added a couple of metal hanger straps to fasten the nestbox to a neighbouring tree, being careful that the nails didn’t protrude into the nest hole inside. I had to use really long nails as the wood was quite soft as you’d imagine.
Assuming that you don’t have a rotten tree with nests already in it, just cut yourself a 2′ (60cm) long section of rotten log. Then around a third of the way down from the top, drill a hole 3/4 of the way through the log using a 3″ (75mm) core drill. Assuming this hole takes you into soft, rotten core of the log, the woodpecker will finish off the job for you!
The original nesting hole location was quite high up so I’ll try to match that height when I nail it to the neighbouring tree. I just need to grab the long ladder now and pop it up, when it stops raining of course…
Stay well
Ian
p.s. Finally got the woodpeckers nestbox up in the tree….
Natural woodpeckers nestbox high up in a nearby tree
