What do they call those ballons that keep the birds away?

[VERN in IL]

What are they called, I was talking to someone at work yesterday that has a bird problem, they're yellow with an eye, and I have no clue what they're called!!

[Brighton]

I put "balloons that keep birds away" into the Google and this was the first hit, you don't need to know the name of something to find it, usually!

http://www.bird-x.com/scare-eye-ball...php?page_id=61

[VERN in IL]

So they are called "scare eye balloons" lol. So I will walk into the feed store and ask for a "scare eye balloon" and he would know what I'm talking about?

[Brighton]

Originally Posted by VERN in IL

So they are called "scare eye balloons" lol. So I will walk into the feed store and ask for a "scare eye balloon" and he would know what I'm talking about?

I would order them online myself, but more than likely some place like Rural King or Farm and Fleet probably has them, the local feed store probably would have to order them, and usually by this time of year bird problems are lessening due to migration.

[spur]

I call them a waste of money. Wife spent about $40 on four of them to keep hawks away from her chickens. She put them on all four sides of the barn where the chickens run. They worked great for a few days. The hawks got used to them after a while and then were back to the buffet table. If you move them around to different locations they work for a little longer but after a while the hawks learn that the balloons aren't moving toward them and ignore them. One of the Fish and Game clubs I belong to bought them to keep the geese from the swimming lake, same deal worked for a little while then the balloons were just part of the landscape and the geese went about their business as usual.

[frogmammy]

So...just take an appropriate color balloon and some waterproof markers and make your own?

Mon

[Darren]

Originally Posted by spur

I call them a waste of money. Wife spent about $40 on four of them to keep hawks away from her chickens. She put them on all four sides of the barn where the chickens run. They worked great for a few days. The hawks got used to them after a while and then were back to the buffet table. If you move them around to different locations they work for a little longer but after a while the hawks learn that the balloons aren't moving toward them and ignore them. One of the Fish and Game clubs I belong to bought them to keep the geese from the swimming lake, same deal worked for a little while then the balloons were just part of the landscape and the geese went about their business as usual.

Don't mow around the lake. Leave a buffer of high grass around the lake with a V mowed through the grass to walk. Mow the V so the geese can't see the water. They can't see predators coming through high grass. You'll never see geese grazing where they can't see a predator approaching.