Native Woodpeckers vs. Invasive Starlings (a conservation effort) 

Some people here need to realize that what this guy is doing is actually a GOOD thing. Starlings and English sparrows were introduced species in the 1890's, since then they have pushed all the naturally occurring birds out and their populations have diminished. Killing a few of them does the world a favor and allows for native species to return.

European starlings have negatively impacted the native birds in most areas in North America. good job bud. thanks for doing your part.

Glad that someone is actually hunting invasive species. We need more people doing that round the world.

I really don't care what the haters say Ted, you should be very proud of your efforts to help those beautiful woodpeckers thrive. Starlings are very mean and aggressive birds, and will freeload any chance they get. How would the haters like to build a house, only to have some squatter come along and steal it, and then not be able to do anything about it? Keep up the good work, and the awesome videos. This one made me a subscriber.

PETA tracked down the nest box location, and removed the bodies in an attempt to resurrect the little bastards. Keep up the good work Ted. I know it's an old video, but ti's still a good one.

I've seen Rat snakes check out starlings holes to see if there are any occupants. I once had a pair of starlings that kept evading me. One day I noticed that there had been no activity at the nest, and sure enough, I found a snake nose poking out of the hole. Raccoons also reach in birds nests.

When I saw the title I thought this video was going to turn me into a hater. Glad to see I was wrong, and that you were actually protecting the woodpeckers and not killing them. Happy hunting.

Eugene Schieffelin introduced two batches of starlings (60 in 1890 and 40 in 1891) so as to introduce all the birds mentioned in Shakespeare to North America. This genius also sponsored the introduction of the house sparrow. What an accomplished fellow.

Wow.. I have to say that I didn't expect to learn so much about the flickers and starlings, specifically regarding their nesting habits. Nice tip about the saw dust... I'm definitely going to try that out. Even aside from the shooting aspects, this is really good information.. thanks for that... learned a lot! As a side note, Starlings do eat a huge number of bugs... you can see them walking across fields in rows, controlling lot of pest insects. Not judging your decision to shoot them... raccoons often reach in and eat birds out of their cavities... that's why predator guards on the entry holes are popular.

You are heroic. Northern Flickers are awesome, awesome birds, and it's a tragedy to see their populations affected by these rats of birds.

You created 3 zombie Starlings, the plague has begun...

probably a weasel got the dead birds. They are small enough to fit through the hole of the bird nest.

Nice vid helping get rid of the invasive species. Why haters gotta hate

Two birds, that I know of, are not protected by any law or treaty. One is the European Starling, the other is the English Sparrow. They can be dispatched at any time, for any reason.

Always good to see a starling take a hit! I like to give the fledglings a bath in brake fluid.

Now, I'm not saying it was aliens, but... It was aliens.

Good job Mr Ted and great shooting and patience. I hate the Starlings, ugly,nasty, make a mess during nesting. I am in Humboldt Co Calif where the nasty ass bird is flying amok. I have done my part and wiped out about 5oo+ out of a million. U da Man............TS

Hey Ted, my wife found your videos and we've been watching them all morning. Your naration and knowledge on the pests you're erradicating is awesome. I only wish the little bleeding hearts making ignorant comments could say the same. Anyway, thanks for the well made, entertaining videos!

Those dogs looked like tiny bears

Birds really do have little wars. I was working on a roof doing repairs and it had a huge nesting seagul colony, when we went near the nests they would attack but the crows would try to stop them attacking us by attacking the seaguls. The crows thought that we were gonna steal the eggs and were trying to help us achieve that lol

I have no interest in hunting and know very little about it but your videos came up and i just clicked one night and have been hooked ever since. Great stuff man,

Ted - raccoons will pull birds out of bird houses.

Gotta say, I love your videos for two reasons: 1. I always learn something new 2. The freeze frames always give me some great art references. So thank you for the videos!

Good shooting. . Love that scope camera combination. .

Northern Flickers are in decline, good on you for taking corrective action against these invasive species.

Ted's video offers a pretty good explanation of why he is hunting the starlings. After reading some of the comments I see that more people should listen and learn a little rather than respond as they do and show their ignorance.

try quickscoping

subbed. fucking awesome. AND HUMANE, I bet alot of haters don't understand that. This is humane pest control of invasive species people... not joykilling everything in sight! keep up the awesome work and vids man.

The woodpeckers ate them! LOL

Thank you for this. I know a lot of bird lovers who get angry when people say they don't like starlings. I would like them more in their native land. Starlings (through the fault of humans) are pushing native birds out. They're the reason my neighborhood no longer has a big variety of woodpeckers now save for the red-bellied ones. Them and house sparrows.

Well done Ted! Great shooting, great backstory and great educational information. Oh.. great sunset as well.

glad someone's doing damage control. Thank you! And haters don't realize the destruction these birds are creating for our native species.

Aliens.

just discovered your channel. great work dude. I really enjoy.

If you don't agree with what he's doing then why are you watching this video?

great story-telling! Thanks for producing and posting!

Love your videos. Shame more people can't comprehend the true meaning of conservation. Keep them coming love your .22 and your filming is awesome. Best on youtube.

great shots....

Ted "We lost the war but not the battle" Me " yeah you did..... wait....WHAT?!"

Keep up the good work. When I was a kid, we had a big multi-unit house for purple martins on the roof of our garage. Keeping the English sparrows from overrunning the place was a never-ending challenge. Going up on the roof and using a hook to pull out sparrow nests was effective but that stressed-out the martins too. My dad got a permit from the city to shoot the sparrows with an air rifle, and he put little "backstop boards" on the corners of the "walkway" that encircled the bird house, since sparrows like to perch at those corners. That way, any errant shots would be stopped instead of sailing off into the neighbors' places. My dad used the now-classic Sheridan air rifle for this, pumped up only into the low part of the range of use-able pressures, again for safety in the neighborhood. Another trick was a home-built trap, which was a "decoy bird house" with dried grass sticking out the entrance hole (so it looked much like a sparrow nest). The sparrows couldn't resist checking it out, and once inside, a lightly counterbalanced trap door would give way beneath them and drop them into a fabric bag hanging under the house, and then the trap door would swing shut again, ready to fool the next sparrow into thinking there was a "floor" in there. We got rid of countless sparrows with that trap. I don't have any kind of air rifle these days, so if I had found myself in your position with that flicker nest, I think I would have just prepared a little patch to tack in place and cover the doorway of that nest box before the young starlings took to the wing.

Any update to this story Ted?

i think you meant to say although we lost the battle we won't loose the war i think

This is Joshua from Sacramento, CA. I like your videos and you have some great info in them! Keep It up!

thanks for the idea for the plexiglass in front of the woodpecker birdhouse. Great idea as we have nasty starlings here on the East Coast too.

How to kill starlings without doing anything yourself: 1. get a cat 2. wait

I still say people need to get a taste for these birds. They are actually quite good. Cook like you would dove or any other small fowl.

You are badass my friend. You're providing a service and you do it with excellence and professionalism that is incredibly impressive.

I rehab native songbirds and shoot starlings/house sparrows daily when I can. I only wish my aim was better. I've had starlings kill downy woodpeckers, bluebirds and nestling red belly woodpeckers in my yard. They're non-native and I appreciate your work, Ted. On behalf of native birds everywhere, thank you.

maybe a flecker took it to acknowledge the revenge

A raccoon or maybe a crow or raven.

Whenever you show footage of the birds you like through your scope, it really brings to mind the fact that the difference between their continued existence and their immediate death is the way that you feel about that bird species.

nice pics and footage of the flickers. great job on the starlings.

Save the bullets for zombies.

Waiting two, three hours to for those critters to pop out their head? Ain't got time for that,bro...take the ladder, drag them out, twist the neck...let the cats enjoy a tender snack. 😺😺😺

I went to school with a guy that was a southern flicker. Every time you looked at him he was digging for gold. 😂😂😂😂 Good video as always!!!

This was such a well done video man

I started thinning out the Blackbirds near me, in MO.... I've noticed that other birds have learned about my actions and have closed in on my proximity. We have Starlings, Brewers blackbirds and the common Grackle that travel together. After a couple shots with my NP2, they don't come back for hours on end. The wood peckers have started thriving, and also the cardinals. The Grackle is not an evasive species, but is huge compared to a starling. All of the blackbirds are considered pests here. Can you make a super detailed video about sighting in a scope? No one ever says which way to turn the turrets to get the correct results for shooting at distance. When it comes to scopes, I am sort of dyslexic. I turn the turret the wrong way and miss by a mile. And I shoot up into the trees so I don't hit anything else.... which makes my scope even more off. I'm sort of a beginner at using high powered scopes... I'm too used to open sights... and My new airguns don't have sights.

shot every damn starling u possibly can they are the worst bird ever

Great shooting and excellent camera work!

It seems that three already dead starlings would make an excellent meal for any pine snake, or similar species, that came along to investigate a nest. Unless snakes aren't common in the area, of course. I learned quite a lot from your video, thank you for being such a strong advocate of our native birds.

lol those dogs?? looked like bears so cute

The owner took those dead birds out

Hey, Ted. I just LOVE the "Little Giant' ladder, which is what I THINK you were using there. I've had mine for almost twenty years now, and still good as new!

You read my mind. Those *adorable* little pups look SO much like little piggies!

I'm thinking raccoons reached in there and grab them

I thought the little fluffy things at the end were bears!!

Good job. I was taught from a young age, it is always open season on starlings.

Ted forgot to mention that it was a full moon that night, so the dead babies obviously escaped the box when they became zombie starlings upon the rise of the full moon.

Those things at the end look like black bear cubs..?

Ants ate them YO! There is a video on youtube of a gecko that gets completely devoured by ants withing hours

Nice shooting and I like the video through the scope slowed to observe the trajectory. Starlings are a PIA.

NICE DUDE great shooting i wonder if i can do that with the titan np i just ordered lol im a shooter but im not sure about the capabilities of this gun if you have any info let me know thanks dude

Keep shooting

Starlings are cannibals...just sayin'

Watching all your vids again and making sure I hit that like button for you. I have a hatsan .22 I copied the model number thats why its bold sorry about that. Whats the best accuracy gun that you have used that is cheap? lol Thanks, Marc

Love the videos I'm a city person and I learn a lot from watching this channel.

I also have a plague of birds in my home .They are destroying my organic garden but this is not my main worry : there is a big bird that is killing my chickens and this is the big target.I think I must get this rifle

Are you ready for zombies/

Very interesting and informative. Thanks and very well done. I've had Starlings take over boxes. I put my ladder up and clean out the young. It would seem a lot easier than waiting for them to poke their heads out.

100 Starlings were brought from England and let loose in NY in 1900. They rapidly bred like flys and spread throughout North America . They displace Blue birds as the "rats" of the avian world, taking over their nests like the flickers as we see here. I respect your care and attention to clean kills and the fact that you eat what you kill. Pidgeon our native Rock Dove is good eating. Keep it up and I will join the rat kill when I get an air rifle. M

owles

the point of this channel is to hunt animals that land owners cant kill them selves , he is not doing most of this for fun , he makes money both uploading videos & hunting , so if you dont like that fact then you can always watch other youtube videos (:

I love your informative videos. Keep up the good work.

i got a good genuine laugh and some giggles outta that thanks . im gonna show the kids in the morning.

good shot and good film

Well done, I love the Starling shots you take. They are pests, and should be treated that way. I guess people don't realize that they are bad for our indigenous birds. Great, thanks for showing that Gio

Well done Ted. Around this time of year my brother and I team up with our pellet guns and take out as many starlings as we can. My grandfather has some boxes that Martins always come to but the starlings will come and kick them out.

awesome shots....

Thanks for protecting the native species. In the US Starlings are an invasive alien, for what it's worth, I totally approve. BTW, Nice shootin'. Missing bodies, possums - small but self-sufficient foraging young in July. Maybe a small raccoon?

Another pretend COD sniper pretending the birds are Russian.

Fairly nice video, I think I have watched it before, at least once. I just found the sound track a bit noisy this time, not sure if it is my local audio configuration or if it is the video itself. Anyone else finding the audio part somewhat close to peak source volume, borderline distorting parts of the time?

The bird angels came and got the starlings.

Your enthusiasm of killing these birds is kind of scary 0_0 however I do understand your purpose for killing them.

Good stuff Ted. Love to listen to smart people.

Good shootling and a big fan of your videos! I wish I could shoot half as good as this.

Man love ur videos.. I want an air rifle but can't swing one of the high dollar ones what is a good one around the $150 range

I've found blackbird nests that include feathers and bones of other birds among the twigs and grasses that make up the nest. Maybe other birds took them as building materials? So were the starlings useful after all?

"What happened to those birds?" Almost anything. Curious raccoons, desperate squirrels, ants. Somewhere on RU-vid there's a vid of ants taking a dead small lizard completely apart. Even the bones get taken away, it's amazing.

With bluebird nest boxes it is known that a slotted (incompletely covered) roof the starlings will not use the nest box. This may work with flicker nest boxes as well?

What kind of air rifle is that? Pretty impressive. I’ve got a 22 cal Benjamin Marauder.