While some people might enjoy watching birds in nature, it’s never fun once these animals decide to turn your home into their home. Discover everything essential any property owner needs to know about birds, plus how to keep these cute–yet harmful–creatures away from your yard.
Depending upon the species, birds’ appearance can greatly range. Some birds have incredibly huge wingspans, such as the falcon, while others can fit in the palm of your hand. All birds possess wings, feathers, and a beak, and can often be seen soaring through the air. If birds are nesting in your home, take careful note of their features in order to best describe them to a pest control professional that can safely remove them from your property.
Are Birds Serious
While birds themselves do not pose a physical threat to people, they can often carry significantly harmful diseases. Contact with birds can spread these diseases easily to humans, which should be avoided at all costs. Their droppings can also cause disease-spreading fungus to grow. Therefore, for the health and safety of anyone living in your home, it is recommended to remove bird populations from your property. Birds can also cause structural damage when building nests and impair everyday activities.
How Do Birds Enter My Property
Birds generally settle on your property when looking for a safe, secure area to build a nest. Many birds will easily fly towards your roof, or other nooks and crannies in your house. Some birds can even come inside your house through open windows, doors, ventilation units, and chimneys. Even just a small hole is enough for a bird to seek out shelter inside your home.
Types of Birds
There are over 1,000 different types of birds currently located in the USA. However, many of these species live comfortably in the wild and often do not pose much of a pest problem to homeowners. Some birds, on the other hand, are common offenders. Pigeons, sparrows, crows, geese, and a range of other species can disturb homes nearly everywhere.
The most common bird pests in California are the pigeon, house sparrow, starling, and crow. It’s important to recognize these species and their unique characteristics in order to more effectively remove them from your property if a pest problem ever occurs.
Life Cycle and Reproduction
Birds emerge from eggs as hatchlings. They will remain in their parents’ nest until they are able to fly and fend for themselves. In this stage, they are called nestlings. However, once a bird can successfully leave the nest after hatching or hops after its family is called a chick. Usually, a baby bird can leave a nest after 2-3 weeks, although this timeline depends on the species. The bird then goes through a short juvenile phase before reaching the young adult stage. In this stage, birds can begin to breed. Spring is the typical mating season for birds, as there are generally more resources and milder weather conditions.
Behavior and Diet
Depending on the species, birds can eat a variety of different things. Many birds enjoy eating insects, seeds, grasses, fruit, and even nuts. Larger birds of prey might eat small animals, such as rodents or snakes.
Different species of birds have different behaviors. Birds like geese usually live in flocks and can be aggressive to other animals. Many geese are migratory and move to different locations depending on the season. On the other hand, birds such as crows prefer to be either solitary or band together in larger groups.
There are a variety of different techniques available for homeowners to manage bird populations. When it comes to bird populations, these techniques should always be humane and safe for the animal. A few examples include spikes, gel, sound cannons, lasers, and slopes. All of these pest control methods do not rely on harmful chemicals in order to effectively repel bird populations. For example, setting slopes on any outdoor service makes it uncomfortable for birds to nest on, sending them in search of a different location.
Additionally, many bird populations are protected and require special solutions to remove them as well, making it essential to call in for professional help.