Plastic Bird Spikes

Will Using Bird Spikes Hurt Birds?

When dealing with pesky birds, many people feel like they have to make a choice between living with the birds or killing them.  In reality, hurting birds isn't necessary at all whatsoever.  When people first hear of bird spikes, images of impaled flying animals enter their mind. The truth is that nothing ever gets hurt with these things.  In fact, they are pretty harmless.  So how do they work if they don't hurt anything?

The way bird spikes work is that they annoy the birds more than anything.  Here is what happens:  A bird is flying around and thinks it is about time for a rest.  It takes a look around and sees the railing on your balcony, thinking that it would make a great landing spot.  As the bird is about to land on your railing, he suddenly sees all of these pointy plastic (or metal) things covering the landing spot.  Realizing that this won't make a good spot to sit after all, the bird just flaps its wings and flies on to find another spot more hospitable.

In most cases, birds will never actually land on your bird control spikes.  In the rare occasion that they do, they will land between the spikes and quickly realize that it isn't very comfy at all and move on.  Keep in mind that different bird spikes are best suited for certain types of birds.  The spikes come in different widths to suit different sized birds.  The narrowly spaced spikes are best for smaller birds like sparrows and wider spaced spikes work best to deter pigeons, magpies, crows, and other similarly sized birds.

While plastic bird spikes are great for some uses, mostly on ledges, railings, signposts, and other similar locations, there are other products out there that work better for other locations.  If you are trying to control birds in a larger area or in a place where it isn't feasible to install plastic bird spikes, there are some other products that you can consider using that won't hurt the flying critters.  Some other solutions are specifically designed to scare off different birds, such as geese, woodpeckers, seagulls, and pigeons.

As you can see, using bird deterrent spikes to deter pesky bird problems is actually one of the most humane and non-invasive choices that you have.  In addition, they are also one of the most cost efficient ways of dealing with the problem as well.  If you need to get the birds off your railing, awning, windowsill, or other location, these should really be your first choice before trying any more expensive options like ultrasonic speakers and the like.