Birds Do Have Friends
An excerpt from the book, Holden Beach History, by John F. Holden.

The martin is one bird that does not have many natural nesting places; therefore, it depends on man to provide places for them to nest.

Many people provide nesting places for martins because they like to watch the birds. Others provide nesting places for them because of the bird's reputation for catching mosquitoes and other insects.

Prior to the 1950's, most rural families kept a flock of chickens to provide their family with eggs and poultry meat. Hawks and crows were very destructive to the chickens. The hawks would catch the baby chicks running loose around the yard or field. The crow would watch for a hen's nest in the edge of the woods so they could eat the eggs.

Families who had chickens attracted martins for other reasons. These birds are very protective of their young. Therefore, wherever they build their nest, they establish a protective zone of several hundred yards around their nests. Most of the time during the nesting season, one or more birds stay on watch; if one sees a hawk or crow approaching and gives a distress call, the whole flock of birds converges on the enemy.

Granddaddy Holden had several martin houses erected around his yard. No doubt, during the latter part of June 1928, both eggs and little birds were in these martin houses.

One beautiful morning, Granddaddy had five or six people "chopping corn" in a nearby field. A lone osprey (fish hawk) had been to the ocean, a flight distance of about a mile and one half, where he had caught a fish. The osprey, returning to serve fish to its hungry nestlings in the top of some dead tree, made a mistake and invaded martin territory. The martins converged on the osprey in a vicious attack. The osprey, laden with the big fish, was forced to drop it in the field. The hired hands working in the field, had been observing the action of the martins and osprey. They rushed to recover the fish that had been dropped. They were surprised to find such a large speckled trout. The fish was very much alive; the osprey's talons had done very little damage.

The fish was taken to Granddaddy's house and served for lunch. It was so large the two could not eat all of it; no question, this fish was fresh!

Osprey Versus Eagle

One October morning in the late 1940s, my father and I were checking some property on Shrimp Street. We were standing about where 122 Shrimp Street is today; at that time there was no house on this street.

It was a beautiful morning with a gentle north wind blowing and the ocean water was a rich blue. The menhaden fish boats had been catching fish close to the beach.

Ospreys were plentiful along the Brunswick County coast in those days' there were a few eagles also. This was before DDT had affected these birds.

Dad and I witnessed a unique occurrence that morning-one that very few people will ever see.

An osprey caught a fish near the Ranger, a blockage runner grounded in the surf. The osprey was in flight toward the woods, was about one hundred feet high over Ocean Boulevard East, when the distress sound attracted our attention. In addition, the flight action of this osprey was unusual. Normally they will not exceed two hundred feet altitude in flight toward the woods to consume their prey. It appeared this one was trying to exceed the normal altitude as fast as possible.

Before this osprey reached half-way to the Intracoastal Waterway, it was almost three hundred feet high and was continuing to make the distress sounds.

AT this point, we discovered a big eagle; it must have had a wing spread of five or six feet. This eagle was just above the tree tops in the woods, traveling at a fast speed and gaining altitude. The course it was traveling would intersect with the osprey's course.

My father and I were speechless, just wondering what was going to happen. As the eagle approached from a lower altitude and reached a point of about ten feet under the osprey, the osprey's fish was released. The eagle caught the fish as easily as a man could catch a baseball and carried its prey to the woods. The disappointed osprey circled around over the beach and hoped for a better day.

Martins On the Beach

Evidence of Hurricane Hazel damage was still visible the spring of 1956. The natural vegetation had not grown back along the beach front; this allowed the wind to blow the shifting sand around like snow.

The loneliness and stress must have inspired my father to build and erect a martin house. The house was placed on a security light pole by his garage and martins did nest in it that spring. This was the first martin house on Holden beach, and the birds continued to build in it several years after Dad's death.

While I had serious health problems, 1975 till 1978, a neighbor built a martin house for me, and I bought one; both of these houses were erected by my garden. Since that time, I have erected more houses and gourds. It would be difficult to estimate how many young birds have hatched and flown from my bird sanctuary in recent years. I enjoy watching them in flight.

Blue Birds

Another friend brought me a design of a bluebird house. I was interested n the bluebirds because they were almost extinct in Brunswick County from 1950 till 1975.

When I became mobile again in 1979, I consulted the 4-H Club leader in this county and asked him if the boys and girls would be interested in erecting some bluebird houses if I build some and donated them. He advised me later that they did like the idea.

I built sixty bluebird houses, donated them to the 4-H Club, and requested the leader to limit one to each member; this would spread these houses out over a larger area. I was so weak at that time, I could only work at the houses an hour or two each day; therefore, it took me over two months to build them.

In 1982, the women in our church planned a bazaar to raise money. They requested me to build bluebird houses for them to sell; I lost count of the number I build, but the sold almost $400.00 worth.

A pair of bluebirds was observed feeding in my garden here on the beach in the spring of 1984. Immediately I erected a house for them, and they returned the next day and accepted it for a nesting place. To the best of my knowledge, these were the first bluebirds to raise a brood on Holden Beach; more birds have been hatched in these houses each year since. Some of my neighbors had bluebirds build in their boxes in 1985, 1986 and 1987.