A Safe Home for Bluebirds

The Laurel Fork Courier
Stories From the Back Roads of the Blue Ridge
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A Safe Home for Bluebirds: Why This Simple Cedar Box Has Bird Lovers Talking

2 days ago | Carol Ann Pruett | Advertorial
Harold Pruitt holding one of his cedar bluebird houses in a sunny meadow
Harold Pruitt (73) with one of his last cedar bluebird houses.

The Hidden Danger in the Backyard: Why a Birdhouse Alone Doesn’t Keep Bluebirds Safe

Millions of people hang a birdhouse every spring and hope for bluebirds. But inside many of those boxes, a quiet drama plays out. Everyone looks at the birdhouse. Almost nobody looks at how it’s built.

Bluebirds can’t make their own nesting holes. For hundreds of years they used old trees and wooden fence posts. Most of those are gone. By some estimates, bluebird numbers dropped by up to 90% in the last century. Today, most bluebirds depend on the boxes people put up for them.

By the numbers
  • Up to 90%By some estimates, that is how much the Eastern bluebird population dropped between the 1920s and the 1970s.
  • Tens of millionsHouse sparrows and starlings, brought over from Europe in the 1800s, now compete with bluebirds for every nesting hole.
  • 1978The year bird lovers founded the North American Bluebird Society — and started bringing bluebirds back, one box at a time.

And that is where the trouble starts.

The “Sparrow Trap”

A house sparrow chasing a bluebird away from a cheap store-bought birdhouse
A house sparrow on the perch of a cheap store-bought birdhouse, chasing the bluebird away. This is how many nests are lost.

Most birdhouses in stores are made to look cute, not to protect birds. What looks like a cozy home can quickly turn into a trap. Bluebird experts see the same four mistakes again and again:

The 4 most common birdhouse mistakes
  • 1. The perch: Bluebirds don’t need a perch. House sparrows do. They sit on it, wait, and then take over the nest.
  • 2. A hole that is too big: Anything wider than 1½ inches lets starlings in. They are bigger and stronger, and they push the bluebirds out.
  • 3. A box that is too shallow: In many store boxes the eggs sit just a few inches below the hole. A raccoon or a cat simply reaches in.
  • 4. Thin walls and dark paint: On a hot July afternoon, a thin painted box heats up like a car parked in the sun. The babies inside can’t get out.

What It Looks Like in a Real Backyard

A starling in an oversized hole while a female bluebird waits with nest grass A raccoon reaching into a shallow birdhouse while bluebirds watch Sparrow junk stuffed on top of a bluebird nest with blue eggs Broken bluebird eggshells in the grass, a female bluebird on the fence above
From readers’ backyards: a starling takes the box while the bluebird waits with her nest grass — a raccoon reaches into a shallow box — a sparrow piles junk on top of the blue eggs — and the broken shells left in the grass.

Most people never find out what went wrong. They just notice that the bluebirds don’t come back — and think it was their fault.

For a bluebird family, the box is the only safe room they have. If the box fails, the whole season is lost.

One Man Saw It Happen in His Own Garden

Harold Pruitt knows this trap better than almost anyone. The 73-year-old cabinetmaker from the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia saw it happen right outside his kitchen window — and it changed the rest of his life.

“Bluebirds are tough little birds,” he says. “It’s the houses we give them that fail.”

From a $4.99 Birdhouse to a Life’s Work

The old $4.99 birdhouse on a shelf in Harold’s workshop
Harold still keeps the old $4.99 birdhouse on a shelf in his shop.

It was the spring of 1981. Harold’s wife, June, bought a little birdhouse at the hardware store for $4.99. Harold hung it by the garden gate. A week later, a pair of bluebirds moved in. Every morning, June watched them from the kitchen window.

On the ninth day, Harold lifted the roof to take a look. The mother bird was still sitting on her five blue eggs. She never flew again. A house sparrow had sat on the perch, waited, and gone inside.

“It wasn’t the bird’s fault. It was the box.”— Harold Pruitt

That winter, he built his own. Every spring he watched what went wrong and fixed it. It took him twelve years and 31 tries. In 1993 he finally had a box he could trust. He has built the same one ever since — and hung 64 of them on posts along his road.

Every May for more than 30 years, Harold walked that road with schoolchildren from Floyd and let them count the blue eggs.

3,811 Pencil Marks on a Barn Door

Harold on a bucket adding a pencil mark to his barn door
One pencil mark for every young bluebird that left one of Harold’s boxes.

Every time a young bluebird flies out of one of his boxes, Harold makes a pencil mark on the inside of his shop door. Bundles of five, row after row, since 1993.

3,811

young bluebirds have flown out of Harold’s boxes since 1993 — one pencil mark each. The rows are so high now that he stands on a bucket to reach the top.

“When I can’t reach the top of that door anymore,” he says, “I’ll know I’m done.”

A Goodbye With a Heavy Heart

Harold’s hands at the drill press drilling a cedar board
The hole has to be exact. Harold’s hands can’t promise that anymore.

That day is coming now. Harold’s hands have arthritis. They shake when he drills the hole — and the hole has to be exact. “If it’s off by just a little, starlings get in,” he says. “Then I’ve built a trap, not a home.”

For 45 years, his mornings started in that barn. The woodstove on. Coffee on the bench. The smell of fresh cedar. That quiet hour is what he will miss most.

But Harold won’t sell a box he can’t trust. So last winter, while his hands were still steady, he built one final batch. After that, the workshop goes quiet.

A Legacy for People With a Heart for Birds

Harold with his final batch of cedar bluebird houses in the barn
Harold’s final batch, waiting in the barn.

Harold doesn’t want his last boxes to sit in a dark barn. His biggest wish is that they reach people who:

  • value real handwork over cheap mass-produced goods,
  • feel a deep connection to nature,
  • want to give the bluebirds in their yard a safe home.

“My hands can’t make new ones,” Harold says. “But I want these last boxes to do some good. I want them up on poles by March, when the bluebirds come looking.”

That’s why he isn’t asking what they are worth. “Every box still in my barn next spring,” he says, “is a bluebird family that has to nest somewhere worse.”

Cedar bluebird boxes like these cost $80 to $90 in specialty shops. Harold asks $49.

There are 263 boxes left. When they are gone, there won’t be any more.

Harold’s Bluebird House in Detail: What 12 Years Taught Him

A male bluebird feeding at the hole of Harold’s cedar box
Feeding time: the steel plate keeps the hole exactly bluebird-sized.
What Harold’s box does differently

Every detail of Harold’s box is something he learned the hard way:

  • The 1½-inch hole: Harold lost nine boxes to starlings in one spring before he found the right size. Bluebirds fit through. Starlings don’t.
  • No perch: “The perch was never for the bluebird,” Harold says. Without it, sparrows have nothing to sit on and wait.
  • Eggs out of reach: The nest sits about six inches below the hole. A metal ring around the hole stops squirrels from chewing it bigger.
  • Dry and cool: A small wire grid keeps the nest off the floor, so rain drains away. Thick cedar and air vents keep the summer heat out.
  • A ladder for the babies: Little grooves inside the front help the young birds climb out when they are ready to fly.

It’s This Easy:

  • 1Hang it Put it on a pole or post out in the open, facing a field — ideally where you can see it from your window.
  • 2Wait From late February on, bluebirds start looking for a home. They find a good box quickly.
  • 3Watch Swing the front open once a week and take a peek. Few things are more beautiful than five little blue eggs.

What Bird Lovers Say About Harold’s Bluebird House

Reader photo: bluebird house on a pole with a bluebird on the roof Reader photo: five blue eggs in the nest Reader photo: a young bluebird looking out of the hole Reader photo: a woman on her porch with the bluebird house behind her
Photos sent in by readers.
  • ★★★★★

    “I wasn’t sure the bluebirds would really take it. But after just a few days a pair was carrying grass inside! For three years my old birdhouse only got sparrows.”

    – Donna R., Lexington, KY
  • ★★★★★

    “I gave one to my mother for her birthday. She loves it! The front opens like a little door, so she can check the nest herself.”

    – Mark T., Greenville, SC
  • ★★★★★

    “I used to watch sparrows take over every birdhouse in my yard. That always made me sad. With Harold’s box I finally have a good feeling.”

    – Susan W., Springfield, MO
  • ★★★★★

    “On its pole since March. Two big storms and a hot summer, and it still looks like new. Three bluebird families this year.”

    – Chris H., Frederick, MD

“The Right Box Makes All the Difference”: Why Experts Value Harold’s Work

We asked Ron W., a retired wildlife biologist who has looked after bluebird trails in Virginia for over 20 years, to take a close look at Harold’s box:

“Every spring I see how many bluebird nests are lost to sparrows, heat and raccoons. Most people have no idea the box itself is the problem. Harold’s box gets every important detail right. It isn’t decoration. It’s real help for bluebird families.”— Ron W., retired wildlife biologist

Everything You Need: What Harold Sends to Your Home

  • The finished cedar bluebird house: fully assembled, weather-tough and ready to hang.
  • Mounting screws: included, so you can put it up the same day.
  • Easy cleaning for years: The front swings open with one move. Take out the old nest once a year, and the box is ready for the next bluebird family.

Where Can You Buy Harold’s Bluebird House?

Only on this page. Harold doesn’t own a computer, so his granddaughter Kayla set up a small online shop for his last boxes. Every box is packed by hand in Harold’s barn — Harold checks each one a last time, and Kayla takes care of the shipping.

Last Chance: When They’re Gone, They’re Gone

This isn’t a marketing trick. There are exactly 263 of Harold’s bluebird houses left. When that number hits zero, there will never be another one — at any price.

Get one of the last originals at Harold’s farewell price of $49, and give the bluebirds in your yard the safest home they could have this spring.

See the Last Boxes
Check availability →

A Final Word: Thank You, Harold

It is rare that a story stays with us like Harold’s. For him, the boxes were never a business. Many of the children who once counted blue eggs on his road are grown now — and some of them have a bluebird box in their own yard today.

That is Harold’s real legacy: not 45 years of birdhouses, but 3,811 pencil marks and a whole town that learned to look after its bluebirds.

Thank you, Harold. For your patience, for your love of the birds, and for giving us the chance to carry a piece of your trail into our own yards.

Our team has already ordered ours. If you want to give the bluebirds in your yard a safe start next spring, don’t wait too long.

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Limited quantity
  • ★★★★★

    “I walked Harold’s road with my fourth-grade class in 1996 and I still remember my first blue eggs. Now my own kids check our box every Saturday morning. I ordered two right away.”

    – The Harmon family, Floyd, VA
  • ★★★★★

    “We can see the box from the kitchen window, and the grandkids keep a little bluebird diary every spring. Thank you, Harold, for bringing nature this close to our family.”

    – Katherine S., Roanoke, VA
  • ★★★★★

    “I’ve looked after bluebird boxes for years and seen far too many nests lost to sparrows. Since I switched to Harold’s box, it hasn’t happened once in my yard.”

    – Dr. Bernard W., Charlottesville, VA
  • ★★★★★

    “You can tell right away this isn’t a cheap import. Solid, and it smells like real cedar. The farewell price is a kind gesture — it just makes the end of his workshop even sadder.”

    – Monica H., Asheville, NC
  • ★★★★★

    “It really is as easy as described. One move and the front swings open for cleaning. Our box is on its third spring now, with three families every year.”

    – Susan K., Knoxville, TN
  • ★★★★★

    “When I read about the pencil marks on Harold’s door, I had to swallow hard. I ordered four — one for us and three as gifts for friends.”

    – Thomas L., Columbus, OH