Escaping Audubondage

The proud Rossmoor community (late of woodpecker-killing fame) has finally displayed their expensive contractor installed “granaries” which in no way resemble the smallest portion of the recommended measures carefully researched and proposed by the Audubon society. Clearly the idea is to pretend to follow the advice of the pesky do-gooders, and then with a shrug of wealthy senior shoulders say, “well I guess grandpa needs to get the shotgun again!” The mutuals involved resisted all advice as controlling meddlesome “audubondage” and rebuffed offers of help from people who know better to march straight for their favored contractor and throw eagerly wasted dollars on this ridiculous program which will assure happy bird killing for years to come.

Savvy Audubon member Brian Murphy offers this snark on their construction:

These are some nice looking Carpenter Bee blocks! Someone sold Rossmoor a batch of Snake Oil! Attached is what a bee block looks like and what a granaries looks like. I thought they were going to use some of the downed oak (natural material) to make artificial granaries. Part of Audubon’s recommendation was to install artificial granaries for Acorn Woodpeckers, not bee blocks for Carpenter bees.The woodpeckers like to make holes in ‘soft dead wood’ and make their own holes in ‘soft dead wood’ – that doesn’t look like ‘soft dead wood’ and the woodpeckers don’t need holes – they are ‘pretty good’ at drilling their own. So what has been installed in Rossmoor has nothing to do with what Audubon suggested as a partial solution to the mess in Rossmoor. Audubon ought to request Rossmoor not use our name in association with their Carpenter Bee Block project.

This what Brian notes it should have looked like:

This is what a bee box looks like and what Rossmoor paid top dollar for:

I was a little worried about Rossmoor encouraging a massive nesting of carpenter bees, but then I remembered that its okay since they probably don’t use actual lumber on their styrofoam facilities either.