I live in southern California near the coast. We have many fruit trees in our yard including 2 fig trees that I have groomed over the years to make them tall like shade trees in the Midwest. Figs leaf in the spring and start fruiting right away. The young figs are attractive to a few crows but not so many that they are a nuisance. It’s another matter in the late summer and fall when 30 to 50 crows are in the trees cawing and fighting over the figs. They’re welcome to the figs but I don’t like the noise. One year I put a plastic owl on a poll and pushed it up through the leafs so that it appeared to be perched there. That sent the crows away for a few days but once they saw it was not moving they were no longer intimidated and were back in full force in the trees. One night I heard a “whooo whooo” and went outside to see an owl perched on a 20 foot tall poll I have in the yard with a weather meter on top. He stayed there quite awhile but left in disgust when he got no response. Later that night he came back but just for a minute or two. So, this year I was at my brother’s house and a wood pecker was attacking a gutter. My brother got the spider out and that was enough to scare away the bird. I guess Jack didn’t know it had worked. It seemed like a good thing to try so I ordered one. I put it in the fig trees. It scared the h— out of the crows. They were really mad and that afternoon there were 50 crows circling above my trees trying to scare the spider. It just kept going up and down as if to challenge them. It was a joy to see these frustrated crows circling the trees. I could stand their noise because I was getting even with them. I expected them back over the next few days to challenge the spider but they never returned. Then my wife started to notice rustling in the trees but the spider was not being activated. It turns out that a few of the crows had figured out that if they were quiet they could feed without fear of the spider. Too many and there was so much rustling of leaves that the spider was activated. It was a great compromise because I don’t mind the crows eating the figs (I don’t like figs) as long as they are quiet about it. The spider is now resting, storing up energy for next year. Great toy. My neighbors have an all pine siding house up at Tahoe and they are being attached by woodpeckers. As I understand it they bought a couple of spiders and plan too put them up next year.
My brother got the spider out and that was enough to scare away the bird.
Oceanside, California
July 31, 2017