🐦 Guides

🐦 Planning

• Eight native birds: Eastern Bluebird, Carolina Chickadee, Carolina Wren, Tree Swallow, Tufted Titmouse, White-breasted Nuthatch, Downy Woodpecker and Brown-headed Nuthatch. The entrance hole's size and height are set for the bird you pick.
• Two roof styles: Simple (Flat) is the easier build; Advanced (Gable) looks better and takes angle cuts.
• Any number of houses, up to 200 at a time. Every count and every cut follows it.
• Nest-box guidelines for your bird: compares the box you are building with published guidelines, explains where each number comes from, and tells you where to hang it. Main screen → Guidelines → 🔍 View Detailed Specs
• Printable entrance-hole gauge, actual size, to check a drill bit before you drill. 🖨️ Print the Entrance Hole Gauge

🛒 Materials Prep

• Exactly what to buy, with one spare picket for every eight.
• How to pick good pickets at the store, and trimming every picket to 5 1/4".
• A side-by-side flat-versus-gable comparison before you buy.
• A count of your spare predator guards.

🪚 Zero-waste cutting

• Knot Hopper™: mark where the knots are on each picket, so no part is ever cut through one.
• Picket Wizard™: lays out every cut for all your houses at once, around the knots, and shows how much cedar that saved.
• Cutting Guide: one cut at a time at the saw, read aloud. On phones that can listen, tap 🎤 and just say "next".
• Scrap bin: offcuts of 3" or more get a number and are planned into your next job.
• Spare boards are kept: a mapped picket the job did not need keeps its number and is used first next time. Cut boards retire their numbers, which start over after 99.
• Big text you can read from across the shop, and your own blade kerf. Settings

🔨 Assembly

• A drawing and instructions for every step: 10 steps for the flat roof, 11 for the gable.
• Choose Shop (brad nailer) or Field (hammer and nails, good for kids). Each has its own drawings.
• Tap a drawing to see it full screen. The guide reopens on the step you left.
• Ends with where to put the finished house.

💲 Price & Profit

• Enter your picket and screw prices and your markup: see what each house costs, what to charge, and your profit on the whole batch.
• Kits or finished houses. Settings → What Are You Selling?

🏕️ For scout leaders and groups

Choose Scout Leader / Nonprofit when you first open the app (free, honor system). You get:

• Leader's Kit: set up the build once, a shopping list for the whole troop, completion certificates, meeting scripts, and the Bird Study merit badge worksheet.
• Teaching Mode: record your own voice reading each assembly step, and it plays for your group as you go. Settings
• 📱 Share with scouts: a QR code that opens the assembly guide on every scout's own phone, set to the same bird, roof and step. No sign-up for the scouts.

📱 Made for the phone

• Works without a signal once it has been opened: every page and drawing is saved on the phone.
• Stay Awake keeps the screen on at the bench. It is on unless you turn it off. Settings
• Fractions or metric, dark mode, and sound effects. Settings
• Updates announce themselves: tap Update now when the app says a newer version is ready.

🛟 Your data

• Everything you enter stays on this phone. Nothing is sent anywhere unless you choose to send it.
• Clearing the browser's data erases it, so back up: your boards from the Knot Hopper, and leaders' recordings and Leader's Kit. A backup file is also how your work moves to a new phone.
• Shop Tips & Notes: tips for your bird, the store, fasteners and safety, plus a notes pad. ✉️ Send to Alan emails your notes to Alan.

Before you start

1. The first time you open the app it asks Who are you building for? Both choices are free: Hobbyist / Home Builder has every building tool; Scout Leader / Nonprofit adds the Leader's Kit and Teaching Mode. You can change it later in Settings.
2. Pick your TARGET BIRD SPECIES first. It sets the entrance hole's size and height.
3. Pick the ROOF STYLE SELECTION: Simple (Flat) for your first one.
4. Set HOUSES TO BUILD. MATERIALS NEEDED shows the pickets and screws right away.

1Materials Prep

1. Check What to buy. It includes one spare picket for every eight.
2. At the store, follow Pick the best pickets: straight and flat, few knots with none at the edges, and no splits or cracks.
3. At home, trim every picket to 5 1/4" wide. Use a push stick: this is a job for an adult.
4. Number each picket on its dog-ear (pointed) end. The next step measures from the square end.
5. Choose your tools: Shop (brad nailer) or Field (hammer and nails).

2Knot Hopper™

1. One picket at a time: slide it along the screen and mark where each knot starts and ends, with 📍 Mark Start and 📍 Mark End.
2. When every knot on that picket is marked, tap 💾 Save Board. A picket with no knots: tap ✅ Board Is Clear — No Knots.
3. Repeat for each picket, writing the number the app shows on its dog-ear end. Each board is saved as you go. Numbers carry on from your last job; any board that job did not need is still mapped and gets used first.
4. After the last one, tap 🏁 Finish All, then ⬇ Download backup file to keep a copy.

You can skip this step, but it costs cedar. Without the Knot Hopper, the Picket Wizard treats every picket as knot-free and can't plan around the knots. At the saw you have to spot each knot yourself and work out which parts will fit between them, and any part that ends up on a knot is wasted wood. Mapping takes a few minutes per batch and pays for itself in pickets.

3Picket Wizard™

1. Check the roof style and number of houses match what you are building.
2. It lays out every cut for the whole batch around your knots, and shows how much cedar that saved.
3. Choose how to cut:
   • 📋 Board by Board: finish one picket completely before pulling the next. Fewest mistakes and easiest to keep track of. Best for your first build, and for a group.
   • ⚡ Hybrid: cut every piece of one size across all the pickets, then the next size. Fewer spacer changes, but more swapping boards in and out, so number your pickets clearly.
   If a picket has parts on both sides of a knot, the app plans Board by Board instead and says why, so it never has you cut the knot out before the parts in front of it.
4. Tap 🪚 Start Cutting Guide.

4Cutting Guide

1. Tap the screen once and it reads each cut aloud. 🔊 turns the voice off.
2. Make the cut, then tap Next →. On phones that can listen, tap 🎤 and say "next", "back" or "repeat" instead.
3. Offcuts of 3" or more get a number to write on them. Keep them: they go in your scrap bin for the next job.
4. ⏸ pauses and keeps your place. If you close it, it offers to resume where you left off.
5. At the end, tap ✓ Done — Back to Dashboard.

5Assembly

1. Choose Shop or Field at the top; the drawings change to match.
2. Follow each step's drawing and instructions. Tap a drawing to see it full screen.
3. Move with ◀ PREV and NEXT ▶. It reopens on the step you left.
4. The last steps are signing your house and Where to Put It. Tap ✓ DONE and the guide is ready for the next house.

Building with a group

1. Set the bird, roof and tools the group will use before sharing: the code carries them.
2. Open Assembly and tap 📱 Share with scouts. Everyone scans the code and follows along on their own phone.
3. Leaders: the Leader's Kit (under step 5) has the troop shopping list, scripts, certificates and the merit badge worksheet.

Good to know

• On an iPhone, sound starts only after you tap the screen, and the 🎤 does not appear: tap Next → instead.
• Print the hole gauge at 100% size; the circles on the screen are not actual size.
• If the app ever seems stuck on an old version: Settings → Update App.
• Questions or ideas: ✉️ Send to Alan, in Shop Tips & Notes.