Allotment Bird Scarers

Not the best photograph in the world, but you can see the problem. At this time of year, when food is scarce, the disgruntled allotment-holder finds him or herself fighting with birds.

Now the crow, bless him, is really not the problem. He turns up from time to time and will hop down ponderously to snaffle a bit of bacon sandwich, but really he’s not that interested in pecking our broad beans, that’s the pigeons.

And this is the scaraweb!

I ‘scored’ this off freecycle at the end of last year, and while it looks like a crash-landing by Santa, it does seem to be working – also, it’s biodegradable.

The problem with any bird scarer is that birds soon get used to it. You can try:




• Toy snakes (should be more than two feet long)
• Toy cats
• CDs on strings
• Bottles on canes
• Bunting
• Windmills
• Plastic shopping bags tied to string


But any and all of these only work because the birds are surprised and uncertain. As soon as they get used to the whatever-it-is then they’ll be back, pecking the tops out of beans and peas and taking the sprouts off Brussels. So what you have to do, apparently, is change your bird scarer system every couple of days so that there’s a constant novelty to the process. I assume this means that by the end of the week your resident birds will have forgotten what they saw on your plot at the beginning of the week, so they have a longer memory than goldfish, but not by much. Our fellow allotment-holders have a plethora of devices, so I’m going to photograph them and share them with you over the weeks ahead …

Labels: allotment-bird-scarers, allotment-birds, allotment-brassicas, allotment-broad-beans, allotment-pests

Onions in autumn

There’s nothing like ignorance to get you through, is there? And my ignorance when it comes to overwintering onions is … profound. So far I’ve managed to find out that:

Onion sets are planted with the point at the top and the roots at the bottom and with the pointy bit level with the soil. They need to go into either very well-tilled soil or, if they are going into clay or less well worked ground, you need to dig or dib a little hole for them as they can easily be damaged by being pushed into the ground.

Unlike other plants, the smaller sets can actually be more productive because the bigger they are the greater the likelihood of bolting.

Pigeons and starlings (and in our area, seagulls) all have the habit of pecking the tops off the growing sets or just pulling them out of the ground. This year, rather than netting them, I’m going to try covering them with that weird and wonderful Scaraweb that somebody gave me (looks like Father Christmas crashlanded on the allotment and left his beard behind) but if the pesky pigeons do strike, I shall immediately go for a netting tent approach instead.

And so tomorrow - in go the onions!

Labels: allotment-birds, allotment-onions, allotment-overwintering-onions

Bird scaring

Birds are a nuisance. Lovely, but a nuisance, a bit like toddlers and puppies that haven’t been house-trained. And the birds have suddenly discovered that our allotment, which had been fallow for a couple of years, is full of goodies. So I started looking around for bird-friendly but effective bird prevention devices (we can’t afford a fruit cage this year, and anyway, we’d also need a broccoli cage and a cabbage cage and … etc).

And out of the blue, Santa web arrives! Actually, it’s called Scaraweb, and it’s been donated to us by a kind neighbour who ‘didn’t get on with it’ (her words). I can sort of see why she might not. While it is a lovely Santa’s beard kind of article in the packet, when you tease out the strands and spread it over the plants in question (as shown on the packet illustration) it does look rather as if your vegetable plot has been invaded by a giant spider or maybe a mutant silkworm. Anyway, it’s free and I’m keen to see how it works. I’m expecting snide comments and head-shaking from some other plotholders who aren’t in favour of these modern developments. I’m also nervous about the wind … we do get something close to gale force winds in spring and autumn and I’m rather worried that I’m going to go up to the allotment one morning to find it denuded of silky white webbing, and the allotment fence looking as if a giant Santa has collided with it!

Labels: allotment-birds, allotment-fruit, allotment-fruit-cage, allotment-problems

Allotment pests

I was reading The Cottage Smallholder yesterday and noted that Fiona has to net her fruit not just to keep the birds (and her dogs) from eating the ripe fruit, but because the birds (but not the dogs) eat the unripe fruit too!

We certainly have problems at our allotments, but this isn’t one of them and I’ve devoted most of today, while I’ve been pottering around, to working out why. And I think I’ve found the answer. It’s seagulls!

Yes, while they can be a real pest, I suspect that the seagull behaviour over our allotments keeps the fruit-hunting birds away; they certainly like to land in the mornings and poke around in turned soil, but if they see smaller birds congregating on the site they tend to fly down and scare them off so that they can try and grab whatever the little birds were finding. Of course they aren’t equipped to peck fruit from bushes though. Finally, a use for the pestilential things! One person on our allotments actually has a pet seagull that he feeds with cat food on a fork – rather him than me: they have vicious beaks and always look to me like homicidal maniacs who are trying to remember where they left their axes.

We also have a rat problem, and I’m not sure what to do about it. Rats will, I’m told, dig up my root crops and eat my peas and beans, but putting down poison is a no-brainer (a) because I know it builds resistance in the intended victims and (b) there are too many dogs, cats and children on the site for bait to be safe. So, short of taking the dog up with me whenever possible, I’m not sure what to do. So far the only thing the rat has done is tunnel under the compost bin and eat some of the scraps we put in there, but I wonder what it will do next …

Labels: allotment-birds, allotment-fruit, allotment-pests