Cocky or other heavy bird damage challenge.

[Ross the fiddler]

While searching for subjects to photograph I was down in our backyard where I could get more of a view (beyond our own trees) of neighbouring properties across our gully to look for any autumn colours (there were some starting) & I noticed this interesting looking bird sitting on someone's antenna stays (at least at first distant sighting) until I realised it was a plastic owl in a feeble attempt at keeping other birds from sitting on their antenna. Should have had one that could at least have taken the weight though.



E-M1 II & MC20+40-150 f2.8 lens.

[Ian]

How odd - it's amazing what some people do

Could it be a kind of scarecrow to frighten something away?

Ian

[Ross the fiddler]

Yeah, it normally has a movement sensor in it with a sound (a horrible sound) emitting & eyes lighting up. I don't know if that was what they were hoping to continue to use. How do I know? I was silly enough to buy one, but not really seriously to use it, but the cockies keep steeling our citrus fruit though.

[Luv2shoot]

There's no need to doubt that putting a fake owl in your yard will deter birds because a study has confirmed it. The study was conducted at Linfield College in Oregon, and it concluded that fake owls were effective bird deterrents but only for a limited time. The strategy works because owls are natural predators of songbirds. Cornell University also reports that plastic owls deter birds – specifically woodpeckers – but that deterrence lasts for only a few days.

[Ross the fiddler]

Except it would be more likely to keep the birds away that should be encouraged & have nil effect on the pest visit of cockies (they're native & protected, but still can be a nuisance).