I have spent a lot of time this winter studying and analyzing my ChirpyNest house. I see a lot of posts each year where landlords are worried about the heat in their Martin housing, I now see where the Troyer gourd maker is cautioning about the need for venting in plastic gourds and I couldn’t agree more. A plastic gourd is kinda like a port-a-potty, a hot plastic box, and without a source of fresh air from below, there is no flow through the box. When a nest is built in a gourd, the drain / vent holes are blocked by the nest material and the only source of fresh air is from the entrance opening, IF ventilation ports are added to the gourd. Without added ports there is no flow at all. No wonder young jump. Even with added ports the flow of fresh air is from the entrance hole to the vent, leaving the nest bowl without air flow. Even with the pvc elbows (the most common form of venting in gourds) air is being encouraged to flow down through the downturned elbow, and out of the gourd, an unnatural way for air to flow, meaning heat has to build up in the gourd and be pushed out, still leaving the nest bowl un vented.
The ChirpyNest cavity has true flow through ventilation that ventilates the entire cavity. tests I have done over the past two years proves this works and has kept the average maximum temperature in these cavities almost 1 degree below the air temperature. Gourds have averaged at least two degrees over the air temperature.
For the 2019 season I am replacing all my plastic gourds with the ChirpyNest. I will be studying the number of “jumpers” I have by doing this. Over the first three years using ChirpyNest I have not had a recorded jumper from these but as anyone that has dealt with jumpers knows it is difficult to pinpoint exactly where these jumpers come from. By having only ChirpyNest I am expecting very few to NO jumpers due to the excellent ventilation of this system. Another reason I am looking forward to the 2019 Martin season.
