brassicas eaten by pigeons

[baggyman]

what's the law on shooting wood pigeons? can you shoot as many as you want?

[rogesse]

Pigeons - hate them, not only did they eat 3 attempts at cabbages last year, they wake me at 1st light cooing (sqawking loudly) to attract a mate!
As to control, only netting has worked so far although the sacreficial crop idea has merit - I was wondering what was wrong with a row of early cauliflower I'd forgotten to net (not one touched) until I saw the devastation to my purple sprouting...........

[Flummery]

You can shoot them - but another will come and fill the niche. The only way is to deter them. Deter one and you'll deter them all. Shoot one and the next pops up!

[mrs dog]

Feathered rats do it for me! I hate them. My grandfather used to shoot one (actually he shot loads cos they ate them) and stick it on a pole wafting in the breeze. I'm not sure of the why but it certainly worked.

[skegblade]

Netting is the only way to stop them getting at your plants, but make sure you support it above them, or as mentioned earlier they'll just sit on it and collapse it. I made a frame from an old single divan bed covered in fine mesh netting and have no plants eaten, either by pigeons or slugs.

Phil

[Mike and Louise]

One thing we did try last year apart from netting, was to stick long 1" think lengths of tin foil (kitchen foil) to 6' long bamboo stakes. We pushed these into the ground about 2 feet apart all over the veg beds.

When the wind blows (even a slight breeze) the foil moves and sun reflects off it.
This movement and the flashing sunlight seemed to do well at keeping ALL birds off the un-netted veg beds.

We have enough netting now to cover all 3 of our beds but we will still use tin foil and bamboo canes to keep the birds off our peas and beans.

[Paulottie]

CD's or tinfoil will not stop hungry pigeons at this time of year...they get used to it pretty quickly.

[Two_Sheds]

Just a heads-up really: the net has been blown off my Broccoli, and the pigeons have stripped the plants.

Beware the piggy-on
(where's Minty with his shotgun when you need him?)

[cupcake]

I have lots of trouble with the flying rats, but apart from netting is there any other way of getting rid of them?

Shotguns come to mind!

[Farmer_Gyles]

all my brassicas up the allotment have been stripped ... i'll sow loads more .....
hopefully will get up there before christmas to make a netting frame to go over the brassica bed ....

[kate&rob]

it happened to me once, learnt my lesson, always net them with either enviromesh or fleece. you have obviously learnt the lesson hard but early. good luck with them.