Post Falls man has built birdhouses across North Idaho for 60 years

Elton Turcotte has spent six decades putting birdhouses into trees across North Idaho, leaving a visible trail of handiwork from Post Falls to Cocolalla and along the Chain Lakes. At 72, he still makes about 10 houses a year, and each spring adds another small marker to a tradition that has become part wildlife help, part neighborhood habit, and part North Idaho identity.

Turcotte said he started as a kid, when he had to push a wagon around town because he did not yet have a driver’s license. He would look for the right tree, ask the property owner for permission and install a house for birds. The routine taught him about people as much as about wildlife, and it is still how he approaches the work decades later.

His birdhouses are built for different birds, from smaller boxes for bluebirds and swallows to larger ones for ducks. He has also begun making multi-unit boxes, a joke he describes as condo-style housing for birds. The work is simple on its face, but the need behind it is real. Idaho Fish and Game has warned that bluebirds face a housing shortage because nesting trees have been cut for firewood, cleared for development or removed from landscapes where old hollow trees no longer stand.

That shortage matters in North Idaho because bluebirds are cavity nesters, and the mountain bluebird is Idaho’s state bird. The state adopted it in 1931. Audubon says mountain bluebirds live in open habitats and often benefit from nest boxes, while the North American Bluebird Society says its mission is to promote recovery of bluebirds and other native cavity-nesting birds across North America.

The Coeur d’Alene Audubon Chapter, which says it has been conserving and protecting local bird populations and habitats since 1990, serves Benewah, Bonner, Boundary, Kootenai and Shoshone counties. Its local range mirrors the same country Turcotte has been working in for years, where development and land clearing have made natural nesting sites harder to find and artificial boxes more important.

The charm of the ritual is in how quickly the birds claim the houses. Turcotte has said he likes to head out on a boat with a friend, bring a small ladder and make a day of it, turning the yearly installation into an outing as much as a project. In a region changing fast, his birdhouses have stayed the same kind of promise: a simple home, placed by hand, and built to last.