South Sound Bird Alliance is pleased to add another prairie to the areas where our nest boxes are installed, monitored and maintained. SSBA has partnered with Mason County PUD and will install ten poles and nest boxes on the section of Johns Prairie adjacent to their main office. Currently there is a Frisbee golf course on this beautiful remnant short-grass prairie. We expect the Frisbee players, bluebirds, and swallows to co-exist peacefully.
The idea for this expansion started when Melinda Wood, a SSBA member and nearby resident, saw Western Bluebirds with their juveniles on the property during a walk. Over last spring she saw two sets of adult bluebirds and four juveniles. Fortunately, Melinda is already a bluebird monitor at Patrick Vance Dunn Memorial Prairie at Wolf Haven International so she knew just who to contact. The PUD was very receptive to the idea so meetings were held, promising spots for the boxes were picked, and a team of Mason County high school students (employed over the summer by the PUD) installed the metal T-bar poles. The nest boxes will be secured to the poles sometime in the fall so they are ready for the 2026 nesting season.
South Sound prairies are the traditional nesting area for Western Bluebirds and tree cavities were their original nesting platforms. Unfortunately, only a small fraction of the nearly 150,000 acres of original prairie is left and tree cavities in snags are also much rarer now. Due to habitat loss, the Western Bluebird is a state listed “Species of Greatest Conservation Need” in western Washington. Nesting boxes are an effort to reverse that listing. We now have 160 nest boxes on eight prairies in Thurston and Mason Counties. Tree and Violet-green Swallows use these nest boxes as well.
We thank Mason County PUD for their willingness to work with us and we look forward with great anticipation to see the bluebirds and swallows discover their new “digs” next spring.
Photo credit: Western Bluebirds on nest box by Bruce Jacobs.
