Banishing the birds.....

CornerstoneAcre · #1 01/04/13, 01:06 PM

How in the world can one get rid of sparrows?
I have a large barn with a hay loft. The birds get in where the old hay trolley apparatus goes thru the peak of the barn and runs down the length of the barn. They perch up there and crap on our hay (luckily I DO have an aisleway that they mostly poop on since that is directly below the center of the barn). I also have a few lean-tos and smaller barns that house my goats. These birds are getting into every barn and pooping on hayfeeders and in watering buckets!! I have had one goat miscarry (could be TOTALLY unrelated, but who knows) and while I can handle all the goat poo on the ground, bird poo on EVERYTHING is getting out of hand.
I currently don't have a way to reach the top of the big barn. (It really is a BIG barn.)
I did put a piece of loose screen in the smaller doorway of one of the goat barns. I fastened it at the top of the doorway (about a 6' doorway) and it hangs loosely down about 2-1/2 feet. That has seemed to have helped but I have no idea how long the goats will allow that to hang there!!
I bought one of those fake owls and mounted it by two of the barns.....I swear the sparrows are laughing while sitting on his head.
I have a couple of barn cats and one does catch sparrows here and there but she is gaining weight like a sumo wrestler and is loosing her birding skills.
The LGD's chased them for a while, but now seem to have given up.
HELP!!!!!

Chief Cook · #2 01/04/13, 01:59 PM

Don't know if this will help or not, but here goes. In our town they planted trees to beautify downtown. Sounds good huh? I guess they didn't know that birds like trees. Needless to say they have the biggest mess all over the place. They tried setting off firecrackers about 10 minutes before sunset for three days. That was all the time they gave it to work. Some folks could not take the noise. Not sure how well that worked since I noticed they had installed bird netting over some of the trees. You might try the firecrackers to make the barn unfriendly for them. I don't know how your other animals will react to the noise though. Good luck. There are some really nasty germs in bird feces. So don't forget to wash!

phrogpharmer · #3 01/04/13, 02:04 PM

If these are the non-native English sparrows, starlings, or pigeons it is fairly easy to get rid of most of them.
Build or buy a large bird trap. Set it up where the birds can see it, when it is full of birds, bb gun the non-natives and release the natives. If it is all non-native birds in the trap, you can spray them down with soapy water and they will freeze to death in the winter temperatures.

Old Vet · #4 01/04/13, 02:15 PM

The best way is to get rid of anything they can use as a perch. If they don't have any place to perch they will find a better place. Take all of the old hay trolley apparatus out of the roof and where you have a place on top of each rafter place a board to keep them from roosting their. You can kill or discourage them for now but what about next year or a month from now.

OkieDavid · #5 01/04/13, 02:35 PM

Not legal but I've heard from a friend of a friend that a bb gun, flashlight and nightime will go a LONG way to eliminating your infestation.......

Paquebot · #6 01/04/13, 03:54 PM

We need to prevent sparrows from possibly bringing diseases into our pigeon lofts so we've got the one from www.sparrowtraps.net and it's very effective. May go several weeks without a single sparrow and then suddenly have 5 or 6 in the trap at once. So far has caught only 2 non-target birds and released.

Martin

dkhern · #7 01/04/13, 04:10 PM

get an owl decoy ive seen them painted strifoam and inflatable find a way to hang from top. put in a low light ares sparrows will flee at site of shape. ive used kids bow and arrow to shoot fish line over tree limbs then pull up rope. in your case fish line would be all you need to hole decoy.

Callieslamb · #8 01/04/13, 05:33 PM

Our barn cat took care of all the birds last year. Your barn may be too tall for that. Ours has trusses that the cat climbed up and around on to get to the top of the barn. We'd see him up there and think he was stuck. He wasn't - just patiently waiting.

braggscowboy · #9 01/04/13, 09:53 PM

Okie david, her in NE Okla. where I live, birds overall seem to be on the decline. Do not see as many birds as once. Have seen a few jays this year and blue birds are still here. Sparrows are pretty much a thing of the past. Not sure, what the reason, but would guess song birds and other birds over all are on the decline and I sure hate that they are, love the birds.

simi-steading · #10 01/04/13, 09:57 PM

Barn, hay and fireworks... I don't like how that could end up...

Cat....

Awnry Abe · #11 01/04/13, 09:58 PM

The rancher I bought my place from recommended cranking up the tractor inside the barn for about 15 minutes with the doors closed. He said it would deter nesting. I am not so sure about deterring birds that are in for a break from the cold, though.