How do you know if a nest box is being used, by day, by night, seasonally, why it is not being used, or why the target species is not using the nest box?
Monitoring nest boxes is key to answering all of these questions, and there are a variety of methods that people use to monitor nest boxes.
Monitoring nest box use can be as simple as keeping an eye out from a distance to observe any obvious signs of occupation by nesting birds, or noting external signs such as entrance or lid chew marks, or droppings on the nest box lid.
Other nest box monitoring options include peeking inside yourself ,or by using a mobile phone-selfie stick attached to a long painter’s pole, or a cheap endoscope (IT gadgets, car gadgets shops) – USB or wireless with a phone app for viewing also attached to a long extendable painter’s pole. There are also specially designed nest box inspection cameras, that provide much better quality imagery and video of occupants, however are along similar lines as a cheap endoscope attached to a pole.
Wildlife cameras (other names: trail cameras, camera traps) are a great option for recording the stories of the nest box occupants – installed on a nearby tree, or attached to a bracket on the same tree as the nest box. Stories such as who went inside by day and night, who ate the eggs, which species were interested in the nest box, before nesting season began. You will be easily able to tell if a nest box is occupied, as a sitting bird will be recorded entering the nest box after feeding late afternoon or early evening, and/or leaving the nest box early morning.
Wildlife cameras are motion activated, and come in white flash, red flash, and no visible flash options. I would strongly recommend only installing no glow (no visible flash) wildlife cameras for nest box montoring. As you really don’t want to scare off nocturnal nest box residents, or disturb a nesting bird on a windy night, if the camera is triggered frequently by leaves blowing in the wind.
Unlike nest box inspection methods, wildlife cameras require quite a bit more effort – climbing the tree to install, regularly refreshing the card and batteries, and scrolling through lots of imagery of leaves blowing in the wind, to find the ones with nest box action. I love still, calm weather for monitoring with wildlife cameras up trees, and detest windy weather, for obvious reasons!
Timing and frequency of nest box monitoring is an important consideration if you are keen and interested. While possums may choose to sleep in a nest box every day of the year, nesting birds are seasonal.
I’ve solved many nesting problems with regular physical nest box checks during nesting season and by installing wildlife cameras to watch comings and goings.
This has enabled me to quickly discover that a nest has been raided, and by what animal, so that action can be taken to reduce the risk of raids on other nest boxes on our property.
For my possum nest boxes, I checked them every 3-6 months. I generally leave apparently unoccupied for-possum nest boxes for a year in the same place, and install a wildlife camera nearby to see if there is an animal using the nest box sometimes, that I’m missing from occasional visual checks. If no action for a year, then I shift the nest box to a new spot, as there will be a reason unknown to me, for it not being used. I’m sure I’ll check our nest boxes less frequently once we’ve had them installed for a while. It’s still early days, and very rewarding for me.
Some of my nest boxes are seasonally occupied by Sugar Glider mum & bubs, for about half the year. In contrast, my two well-shaded Ringtail boxes have been occupied every day since installation three years ago.
My for-bird nest boxes (possum guards are installed on these trees) are only used during nesting season, sometimes multiple times. I monitor just a handfull of bird nest boxes with wildlife cameras just to discover when nesting season is about to start – much happens when I am away at work. Then once birds are staking their nest box claims, I install all my available wildlife cameras to watch the bird boxes and do some visual checks during the bedding-shredding and egg-laying period, to quickly discover and fix any issues, such as eggs being raided by possums. I have a big problem with high numbers of Brushtail Possums and Sugar Gliders on my property, raiding all bird nests (and nest boxes) they can access – which was all of them, until I began installing possum guards on trees to prevent access to nest boxes.
A neighbour rescuing and soft-releasing possums from her property has resulted in a local very high population density of Brushtail Possums than would otherwise naturally occur. I would disagree that a possum life is worth more than the lives of the numerous other native resident species, who’s breeding success etc is very much reduced by this human-caused increase in a predator species.
Once I have the possum protection sorted for the bird nest boxes, I’ll just monitor them with wildlife cameras. There is always the risk that a predator will be watching, and physically checking a nest box will give away the (previously) secret location of a tasty snack.
A number of people and organisations I’ve talked to that monitor nest boxes do this type of monitoring except with a selfie stick (plus a painting pole) and a phone camera. It’s a bit less invasive for shy animals, and doesn’t involve having to scale the tree to access the nest box. There are also special nest box monitoring cameras on the market for this purpose also.
I also have an expanding collection of wildlife cameras (motion activated cameras designed to monitor wildlife) that I install next to nest boxes to be able to record any action by day night.
These have been vital for answering key questions like what animal is raiding the Rosella and Wood Duck nests? And so helping me decide what method would be best to prevent nest box access to these nest raders.
Many conservation NGOs and researchers use wildlife cameras (also called trail cameras, camera traps) to monitor nest box activity.
There is an ever-expanding range of wildlife camera options, for budgets large and small, for nocturnal shy animals and daytime animals (no glow, low red glow, red glow, white flash). I would recommend a (very) low glow or no glow camera for monitoring nest boxes, as when windy the camera will take pictures even at night and may disturb any sleeping nesting birds. Shy nocturnal nest box occupants can also be quite bothered by a white glow or (bright) red glow camera flash, and may abandon a nest box.
You do get what you pay for with wildlife cameras. The brands that have been makng cameras for longer are in my experience much better than same-priced newer brands. There are some great mid-priced models, which are getting better every year The established brands have better detection algorythms, case design, lower battery usage and image quality I’ve found. I have added in-depth explanations to help with choosing wildlife cameras here.
There are also purpose designed nest box inspection cameras, however these are quite pricey but the image quality is supposedly quite good? I don’t know much about these.
The following two pages cover how often you may wish to monitor nest box utilisation, and an in-depth look at wildlife cameras.