Purple Martin Roost 
(Main St & Hendry St in Downtown Fort Myers)

By Bill Dietrich

President, The Purple Martin Society of Collier Cty (Florida)

Purple Martins (Progne subis) are the largest member of the swallow family in North America, measuring 7 1/2 inches long and weighing 1.9 ounces.

Taxonomically they are placed in the

Kingdom: Animalia;

Phylum: Chordata;

Subphylum: Vertebrata;

Class: Aves;

Order: Passeriformes; and

Family: Hirundinidae

Three races (subspecies) are recognized:

Progne subis subis breeding in eastern North America and eastern Mexico;

Progne subis hesperia breeding in the deserts of Arizona, western Mexico, and Baja California; and

Progne subis arboricola breeding along the Pacific coast of the United States and Canada, and in the Rocky Mountains.

Purple Martins spend the non-breeding season in Brazil then migrate to North America to nest. East of the Rockies they are totally dependent on human-supplied housing. West of the Rockies and in the deserts they largely nest in their ancestral ways, in abandoned woodpecker nest cavities. In the Pacific Northwest, Martins are beginning to use gourds and clusters of single-unit boxes for nesting.

The pair-bond of the Purple Martin is monogamous. The male and female cooperate equally in building the nest out of mud, grass and twigs. The female lays two to seven pure-white eggs at a rate of one egg per day. The female incubates the clutch for approximately fifteen days, then the young hatch. The parents both feed the young continuously for a period of 26-32 days until the young fledge. The young continue to be dependent on their parents for food and training for an additional one to two weeks after fledging. It's not uncommon for the fledglings to return to their human-supplied housing at night to sleep during this period.

Martins, like all swallows, are aerial insectivores. They eat only flying insects, which they catch in flight. Their diet is diverse, including dragonflies, damselflies, flies, midges, mayflies, stinkbugs, leafhoppers, Japanese beetles, June bugs, butterflies, moths, grasshoppers, cicadas, bees, wasps, flying ants, and ballooning spiders.

Martins are not, however, prodigious consumers of mosquitoes. Purple Martins and freshwater mosquitoes rarely ever cross paths. Martins are daytime feeders, and feed high in the sky; mosquitoes, on the other hand, stay low in damp places during daylight hours, or only come out at night. Since Purple Martins feed only on flying insects, they are extremely vulnerable to starvation during extended periods of cool and/or rainy weather.

Please view YouTube Video here: http://www.encyclopedia.com/video/ppw2ns3rNlw-purple-martin-roost-at-main.aspx

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