Birds digging in the Garden

koninklijke, Dec 12, 1:09am
Have tidied up an area about 6 metre by 3 metre, and spend a lot of potted colour. The birds are digging at the roots and in this heat the plants are dying very quickly, is there a way to stop this, I know of slug and snail pellets but is there bird pellets ?, any suggestions are welcome
docsportello, Dec 12, 1:20am
Can't do anything about the weather. You could try putting up some shade cloth. Plants that aren't established by now i.e. freshly planted, are very high risk in this sun. For the birds, you'll need to net the whole area until the plants fill out. Quickest way would be construct two low triangles at either end with poles or bamboo, string a wire between them, and lay the netting over the top - like an old fashioned tent.
koru67, Dec 12, 1:47am
Feed the birds, although by what you have posted you actually want to kill them. At this time of the year the birds are constantly on the hunt for food for themselves and their babies. Plus if you are watering the plants and the rest of your lawn etc is dry from lack of rain, the areas where you have watered will be the best for finding worms.
harrislucinda, Dec 12, 2:19am
yes they are a bugger have a scarecrow at my black - berries but take no notice of that Just been and picked my gooseberries before they get those as well
copperboom, Dec 12, 2:20am
Bird pellets!?! ? Umm. NO!
koninklijke, Dec 12, 2:41am
Don't want to kill them, just make them go away

Was hoping for a horrible smelling plant that will be a deterrent,
or something similar that someone may know of
maclad, Dec 12, 3:40am
You could try humming tape, not sure how well it works.
koninklijke, Dec 12, 4:04am
Never heard of it, so looked on Google, and I think that could be a solution, thank you for that idea
maclad, Dec 12, 4:10am
Hope it works for you. Think they will need to be fairly close together. If I have helped then my daily good deed is now done.
junie2, Dec 12, 8:08am
This! Every gardener I know has this problem. We just have to think smarter than the birds, not kill them. I have an armoury of devices which include poking sticks in the ground around each plant, cutting the bottom out of 2litre milk bottles and placing over each plant, putting taller sticks in and draping some bird netting around. ( Newspaper works too.) These maybe unslightly, but as someone has pointed out, it is feeding season and it won't last much longer, and then you can dismantle the defences.
starseeker, Dec 12, 8:23am
One bright side of birds digging in the garden is that they like all sorts of insects, not just worms, so they can be very beneficial from this perspective,.
annies3, Dec 13, 7:42am
Its quite surprising how much mulch and soil the birds can move too, we have been busy planting out a bank of topsoil with trees and have used lawn clippings as a mulch to help retain moisture and prevent weeds taking over, wherever the clippings have started to rot down the birds scratch for worms, luckily they are not damaging the trees, just making a mess.
muppet_slayer, Dec 14, 5:37am
Apparently birds don't like tinsel blowing in the wind so try stapling some tinsel, or other shiny Christmas decoration, to stakes and put them around the garden.
crazynana, Dec 14, 8:19am
You can also string up old CDs as they flash in the wind and can get rid of some of the birds. Some are not bothered by anything you do unfortunately as they are collecting food as said above.
beebs, Dec 16, 7:03am
Tinfoil flapping does the trick, attached to fence or stick
fogs, Dec 16, 11:52am
We are using this around veges and berries we are tying into our fruit trees and it sure is working
Listing number shows it.1492310103 Very expensive I paid $2 with free shipping in Ali express
moby, Dec 16, 8:07pm
Cat.
elect70, Dec 16, 8:23pm
Doc @ #2 is on to it . sisters place in Perth grow small fruit trees in their back yard but the wild parrotts eat the fruit . Only way they stopped them was by netting over them , even then the parrotts tried to rip it apart to get at the fruit . . Nothing else worked flashing discs tinfoil ,they quickly learned to ignore it .
colin433, Dec 16, 11:57pm
I was going to post about CD's, but crazynana beat me to it, however I will add that they need to be attached so that they spin in the wind. We always hung them in the plum trees and they were very effective. Drill a tiny hole in the edge of the CD, thread a fishing swivel through, and then tie with light string, or fishing line.
They work in the same way that the owls with irridescent feathers work, but THEY are very expensive. If you don't have any old CD's, they are quite inexpensive to buy.
It'\s a good idea to attach some of them high enough that they send a reflection down to the ground, as that is where your birds are. We found that they worked out how to avoid them by hopping along the ground, until we made some of the reflect. Stopped them in their tracks, and we harvested almost every plum
lettice, Dec 19, 4:01am
I use Stockholm tar as a rabbit deterrent. It might work on birds. I put it on stakes, not direct on plants. The pong is strong, but it needs renewing weekly.
annies3, Dec 19, 5:10am
Talking about rabbits ! a great repellent is made with six eggs six hundred mls of water six mls of acrylic paint, mix thoroughly and strain to remove anything which will block your sprayer, spray around areas near plants you want to protect such as roses new trees etc works an absolute treat.
If there is a poultry farm nearby they are usually happy to provide waste eggs which are fine for the job.
bill1451, Dec 19, 5:47am
maybe some mirrors, or if you have access to some old hard drives, the discs in these are as good as mirrors and easy to drill a hole in as they are aluminium.
nerak, Jan 26, 9:43am
Maybe put some netting that we use for tomatoes over the plants until they're bigger.