Providing Shelters
Providing Shelters is the cheapest of the seven activities to start and among the easiest to evidence. Boxes are inexpensive, an inspector can count them on the ground, and a monitored box programme generates census data at the same time, so one purchase can underpin two of your three required activities.
What counts
- Nest boxes for cavity-nesting birds: bluebirds, chickadees, titmice, screech owls, kestrels.
- Bat roosts sized for maternal colonies.
- Brush piles and slash windrows left deliberately rather than burned.
- Retention of standing dead timber where it is safe to leave it.
- Half-cut and hinge-cut cover in overbrowsed areas.
Degree of intensity
A defensible working density is one nest box per 10 to 20 acres, with a practical minimum of six on a small tract. Bat houses are counted individually rather than by acreage. What matters more than raw numbers is that boxes are sited where the target species will actually use them and that occupancy is monitored.
Texas requires at least three of the seven qualifying activities. Use the exemption calculator to size this one to your acreage.
Qualification is determined by your county Central Appraisal District, and intensity standards vary by ecoregion and property size. Nothing here is tax or legal advice. Confirm your activity mix with a certified wildlife biologist before filing.
Common mistakes
- Mounting boxes on trees or fence posts instead of free-standing poles, which hands them to rat snakes and raccoons.
- Enlarging a bluebird entrance beyond 1.5 inches, which lets European Starlings take over.
- Facing entrances west into full Texas afternoon sun, which can overheat a brood.
- Spacing bluebird boxes closer than 100 yards, leaving most of them empty.
- Never cleaning boxes out, so occupancy drops and there is nothing to photograph.
Records that survive a review
Log box number, GPS coordinate, date, species observed and clutch count. Photograph each box with a date stamp at the annual cleanout between late January and mid-February.
Equipment for this activity
Need the plan as well as the gear?
We supply and install the equipment. Written wildlife management plans, appraisal district filings and audit defense are handled by our sister company Plateau Land & Wildlife Management. See also our county-by-county guides.