How to help bluebirds against house sparrows?

I had a tragedy happen with my bluebird family. The five newborns were killed, 3 thrown out of the nest, one hanging dead in the door and one dead in the nest. Blood everywhere. I am very upset of course. My husband took care of it and put the box back where it was even though I said take it down. The next day I saw a house sparrow come out of it. I immediately took the box down. That was most likely the murderer. My question is should I put the box back up after a bit? I had 2 successful families in it last year and was so happy they were in it this year. I feed the bluebirds well, spending too much on mealworms for them. The parents are still around but I'm not sure what to do about the box. I don't want that to happen again. And my husband says he can't take me crying like that again. lol. thanks!

English House Sparrows are truly a bane to the existence of the Eastern Bluebird. They do indeed attack and kill both adults and hatchlings.

Numerous strategies exist to handle the house sparrow problem. First, you should put up a second box so that the bluebirds have an alternate location to nest. The second box should be 20 or 30 feet away from the other box. Another action to take is to carefully monitor the box with the house sparrows and once they have built a nest, remove the nest. Keep removing the nest once it is built over and over again. The house sparrows may make five or six nests (or more), but they will eventually give up. There are other strategies involving removing their egging, shaking their eggs, and other such actions, but I try to stop the problem before it gets to that point. If you do get a nest with house sparrow eggs, which are whitish with brown speckles, destroy the eggs as soon as possible.

All of this will require you to closely monitor the nest boxes. You wouldn’t necessarily have to look at them every day, but maybe every third day. Do not worry about disturbing the bluebirds; they will come back to the box quickly after you have peeked inside.

Here is a link to the best bluebird website I know of. Good luck!

-Naturalist Denise Wolfe