SK Manufacturing, Purple Martin Bird House
Value For Money
SK Manufacturing, Purple Martin Bird House
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User Reviews
Value For Money
Well.. I Bought My Purple Martin House, Just This
well.. I bought my purple martin house, just this April and had it up and pole in the ground by april 5th, 2011. My first martin appeared on april 9th..I was so excited, and low and behold, his mate appeared quickly after him and then a 3rd one. So as far as the house being plastic and them not being interested in it, is like, untrue. Took them a little while to get comfortable, they nested and I am now an official purple martin landlord, we now have 2 eggs ! so much for the person saying they are not interested in plastic. I live in Louisiana and figured I got mine out late ! We get a pretty strong wind off of the Gulf and well my martin house still stands and it is now May 7th, 2011. Anybody get one, hey you will enjoy them, they are used to me now meandering around near them in my garden, they just watch me, don't seem to mind at all. Enjoy, I know I will continue to ! Judy
Value For Money
I Like The Ease Of Putting Up The Pole, And The Di
I like the ease of putting up the pole, and the different uses I find for it. I use the pole to make a Christmas Tree out of lights tied to cord.
Value For Money
Had Martins On House Two Days After Putting The Sk
Had Martins on house two days after putting the SK Manufacturing, Purple Martin Bird House With Triangular Aircraft Aluminium 16 ft Telescopic Pole up. Sparrows love all bird houses. The Martins seem to prefer the S&K over my more traditional wooden house that they have nested in the last two years.
Sk Manufacturing Purple Martin Bird House - All Of
SK Manufacturing Purple Martin Bird House - All of S-K Mfg. printed literature leads you down a primrose path, leading you to believe they have a great product. Martins will not give house a second look but the Sparrows love it. Tri-pole bent in moderate winds....e-mail to S-K unanswered...I believe this is a testimony to their integrity and reputation.
Of course they will not use the house, -if YOU allow the sparrows to nest! You must be patient and do everything to educate yourself about attracting the Purple Martin; ie, such as removing sparrow & starling nests, setting up traps, creating a secure area by adding a predator guard to the pole and away from trees, Putting up PM decoys and even playing recordings of their vocalizations at dawn. I know, sounds crazy, but its worth it.
Also if you call customer service at S&K,.. they will work wit you.. I have found them to be wonderful. Real people actually answer the phone... !!!
We Put Up The Purple Martin Bird House As Directed
We put up the Purple Martin Bird House as directed. The martins came immediately. The first time there was a strong wind, the aluminum pole bent in half.
I Bought A Purple Martin House And 16 Ft. Telescop
I bought a Purple Martin house and 16 ft. telescopic pole made by SK Manufacturing. The warranty said the house was warranted for life when mounted as directed on their triangular 16 ft. telescopic aircraft aluminum pole.
The Purple Martin house went together easily. It was made of plastic and was a simple matter of snapping parts together. It took about 45 minutes to assemble and required no tools.
The 16 ft. aircraft aluminum telescopic pole went together easily as well and following the instructions, I set it in 24" of concrete and put up the Purple Martin house.
That is where the fun ended. The house and pole were up for about two weeks. A wind came. Not a hurricane, as we don't have them in Northern Illinois. Not a tornado either. A 40-50 MPH gust which almost every area of the country can experience before or during a thunderstorm.
My wife watched as the pole leaned from the wind and then bent completely over to the ground!
Upon calling Kim at SK Manufacturing (sk-mfg.com), we were told that the bird house was warranted, but not the pole. We were told that if we dissassembled the the house and determined which parts were broken, they would send replacement parts so we could fix it. If we wanted to fix the pole, we would have to a.) buy replacement sections and b.)reinstall it all in 24" of concrete again only to have the same thing happen the next time the wind blows.
Since most people know that Purple Martins are attracted to multiple unit buildings placed up high in open areas, it is obvious that the pole is not suited for its intended use. It is also obvious that the intent is to get you to buy the useless pole by linking the warranty to the bird house while not warranting the pole (the pole costs alot more than the house).
SK Manufacturing represents all that is wrong with corporate America today. A strong desire to sell with no desire to stand behind ones product, rather to hide behind vaguely worded deceptive warranties on products not designed for their purpose, outsourced customer service, and websites with phone #'s for sales,but none for customer service. They love to hear from you to get an order, but don't really want to hear from you otherwise.
The net result? I'm out about $100.00 for the pole, and house not counting my time to assemble the house, dig the hole, buy and install the concrete for a pole that cannot do what it is supposed to do. The broken house is in the trash, I'll try to recycle the part of the aluminum pole that is not in concrete. I wasted $100. Oh and the house was up for such a short time we never did attract a purple martin.
I found this review very helpful because...I am about to purchase a purple martin house. I have already inserted the pole in concrete.
The House does come with a life time warranty when purchased with the Tri-Tel, Quad Tel pole, or S&K adapters. (Not sure what double talk you get out of that) The S&K House and pole is a very affordable and durable product (the company does stand behind their products). Storms with high winds do cause damage to all sorts of things (trees, homes, cars , and ...). S&K does offer the customer the ability to purchase sections of a pole instead of having to buy the whole pole. To throw away the house when you can get parts to repair it does not seem logical (a warranty is for a manufacturing defect, not for storm damage).
Well, I have the same pole for three years now. We do have simetimes quite strong winds in Wisconsin and 50mph are not too unusual.
My pole has done fine so far - but the plastic Martin house is NOT being accepted by the birds. We watched at least two couples this spring investigate it but they left for some other place...
Q&A
Please can you tell me how to put up flag and Christmas lights to SK tri tel pole?