I edmontese - Piedmontese Association of the United States

PIEDMONTESE | PROFILE
SCARECROWS VS. SCARESHEEP
Sometimes birds can be
a nuisance. I don’t care
if they are blackbirds,
pigeons, seagulls, starlings
or guinea hens.
Starlings have always been
a problem for feedlots.
They eat a lot of grain,
besides desecrating the
feed bunks. One particular
afternoon when I was
having visions of Alfred
Hitchcock’s movie, I sent
one of the feedlot hands to
town to get some replicas
of owls. I had read that
decoy owls would scare off birds. I left that afternoon before he
returned.
The next morning I got a call on the 2-way from the boss. He
was in a fowl mood (sorry), “What the *(#%@ do ya think this is,
Halloween! Do ya think the EPA and the Audubon Society would
approve Are they waterproof Packing guns Where did you go
to school again” “Stanford,” I lied.
I had no idea what he was talking about until I pulled into the
feed yard and started down the first alley. Owls were posted on
every other pen sign with scotch tape! Course you couldn’t tell
they were owls from the side, but from the front it was obvious.
They were cardboard cutouts of cartoon owls, painted black
ON THE EDGE OF COMMON SENSE
By: Baxter Black
and orange. Many were surrounded by starlings perched on the
cable picking their teeth and gossiping. We tried carbide guns,
poisoning, negotiation and bribery, to no avail.
Last fall I was invaded by big black birds. At night, they roosted in
my hay barn, on top of gates, at the water tanks, by the hundreds.
All painting my facilities the color of a bat cave.
I tried decoy cow skulls, dogs chained to the gates, fans, chicken
wire, rap music, old hides, a stuffed deer until…in my frustration,
I sneaked out at daylight with my 20 gauge and dusted one off. I
hung him by his ankles from a horizontal brace post over a gate
12 feet, in the air. The herd of birds departed and have never, not
even once, come back.
Six months later his carcass sways in the breeze as a warning. I
have noticed this method doesn’t work for all species, although
you’d be surprised. I talked to a sheepherder from Idaho that
claimed the scarecrow, or ‘scaresheep’ method worked on finewool
Debolliet. He reported that the ewes had located a loose
stretch of fence line and began crawling under. They’d get onto
the road and get run over by traffic.
The sheepherder laid a carcass under the bottom wire to act
as an example. None crossed at that space, however they just
moved down the fence line about 3 feet and crawled under…only
to be hit by a car.
He finally concluded that the ‘scaresheep method’ did work, but
it just took more decoy sheep. About 3 furlongs worth, piled 2
high in his experience.
FALL 2008 PIEDMONTESE | PROFILE 19