Build a Convertible Winter Roosting Box, Bird House
Make a winter roosting box which can also be used as a bird house in the summer for nesting backyard birds. This is one of the woodworking projects we put together and thought we’d share. We have put two of these up and really enjoyed them. The size for nesting birds is suitable for screech owls, woodpeckers and flycatchers. So far we have had Great Crested Flycatchers nest in this style box twice, and…titmice. Yuppers, the titmice love this house. They have nested in it twice as well.
These are the basic dimensions for woodworkers and not step by step instructions, we had no plan when building them but just kind of mashed together a few successful ideas. Hopefully you can modify to your liking the basic idea and create a friendlier habitat in your own backyard. Our thought was since we put up owl/woodpecker boxes anyway, why not be able to make roosting boxes out of them? By adding the perches in winter we hoped to give the birds a bit of space and avoid them all piling on top of each other.
Above is a winter view of the house with the door entrance at the bottom of the box.
And this is the bird house during the summer with the door entrance at the top along with the dimensions we used.
We used untreated cedar and galvanized screws to build the bird house. During the winter, there are dowels placed inside, threaded through the sides for perches. The dowels were placed randomly but we took care to not line them on top of each other so that the bids wouldn’t be pooping on each others heads. Our standard measurement for guess-tamating this spacing was “about enough room for a titmouse”.
This is a view of the box open in winter roost mode. The door pivots open from the top on simple galvanized deck screws. Note that there are holes through the side of the house to hold the dowel perches and the floor notched at the corners for drainage.
For summer, the dowels are removed and the door flipped so that the entrance hole is at the top of the house. The holes left by the dowels will allow for summer time ventilation.
Also note that the winter front fits flush with the bottom of the box, but in summer when the box is meant to be used as a bird house, it is attached with 1/4″ gap at the top for additional ventilation. In the summer mode photos you can see it does not fit flush to the floor.
An extra piece was mounted to the door as a protector. Woodpeckers and squirrels love to chew and modify doorways. The extra wood can be replaced at a later date and the front of the bird hose will not get ruined by critter remodeling.
Bluebirds, chickadees and titmice are a few species which will group roost in such a box. When they seek shelter in the winter you can provide them some! And if you take this idea and make on of your own please let us know. The more habitat the better, and the more ideas the better!
For pre-built convertible roosting boxes / bird houses you can buy, see: Bird Houses Roosting Boxes.
There's always something in the woods
what type of hardware did you use to connect the bird house to the tree. I don’t want to have to ‘unscrew’ it from the tree to take down and clean…
possible???
Thanks.
flat mounting brackets. They are available in any big bx hardware store, galvanized. We don’t take our bird houses down but use a ladder to clean out the higher mounted.