Another Day in the O.B.B.

That gunshot you just heard was me, taking aim at the flying rodents that are attempting to take up residence in the soffits of our front porch.  Just another day in the O.B.B.  

We've had this problem ever since we moved here.  Funny that the previous owners never mentioned it as a problem.  Yup.  Funny, that.  But we fight on valiantly trying to extricate those damn dirty birds and keeping them from building a nest right over the stairs we use to access the porch.  Here me now people - you cannot enter our house (or front porch for that matter) without the risk of a pigeon crapping on your head!  I'm so not kidding.

Last year we thought we had licked the problem.  My handy hubby shoved a fake owl up there to hoot, hoot, hoot anytime something moved within the vicinity of the roof.  Evidently this is supposed to frighten birds into never coming back to the neighborhood for fear that a vicious great hoot owl will swoop down upon them and snack on their little squabby bellies.  That battery operated owl would hoot, hoot, hoot anytime the wind blew, whenever the dogs strolled by, whenever it rained,  but never, I REPEAT NEVER when there was an attack of pigeon power.  

The second phase of Project Pound the Pigeon was simple.  If we couldn't scare them away with our friend Hootie, we'd have to make their target neighbourhood inaccessible for future nest building, squab-birthing activities.  So we invested a not so small sum of money in bird netting.  Designed to repel anything with wings, we set up the net directly in front of the soffits, stapled 'er down and wiped our hands in what we thought was utter victory over our avian adversaries.  We are so SMART.  We showed those BIRDS.  Take that you little rats with WINGS.  You're not welcome here anymore!  Woo HOO.

Ya, um, that worked for about...oh, I'd say...um...MAYBE A MINUTE.  As soon as we went back in the house those little rodents were back doing their fly by, checking out the new netting, assessing it's flaws, plotting their great migration back to their beautifully restored island  summer house.  

We actually thought they gave up.  For a few months anyway.  Turns out, our poopy pigeons hadn't given up entirely.  They were just biding their time until winter was over and they could return triumphantly to their summer home, a lovely 85-year old farmhouse near the north shore of PEI.  They've returned this week.  And although they cannot climb into last summer's hideaway, they are giving it the old college try, by roosting on the soffits directly above the steps.

So, dear Internet.  You've been warned.  If you visit us this summer, keep your eyes out for flying pigeon poop to greet you at our front door.  Until such time as we buy a gun and I master my target practice, that is.

When my Mom lived in Suwanee, Georgia she used to have a b.b. gun to shoot squirrels.  I'd like one to shoot the damn pigeons.  The apple doesn't fall far from the tree I guess.