At Musterfield Farm in N Sutton NH I noticed a twisted mylar tape that flashed in the wind. They have a huge vegetable garden. I've welcomed birds to the garden but we do not have bird feeders out after April 1 due to local bears. Most of our birds are gold finches, a murder of crows, phoebees, and similar. I suggest that first, you remove the feeders by April 1 to get rid of the freeloaders. We had damage to our strawberries which looked like some ground critters and some birds since some berries were obviously pecked and others chewed. We covered the plants with Agribon garden fabric held down by bricks. This made harvesting a little tedious but worth it since this year we had some great berries. I noticed at Musterfield they had new plantings of some vegetables covered by a lightweight Agribon type fabric. I'm going to do this next year in hopes of protecting squash and cucumbers from beetles. A neighbor uses the black plastic bird netting available at farm and feed stores but warns that some do get caught in the netting so you need to check daily to free the birds but they don't have a problem every day. Usually the phoebees and others sit on my pea fences waiting for a good insect to come by, then swoop after it. I haven't noticed any other bird damage but I think chipmunks or other ground critters are chewing on some tomatoes. Good luck. We have a resident hawk who might be helping out.

I'd hate to try to net 100 apple trees. The cost would be huge. I agree a shotgun probably won't be a long term fix either. Gala If you're serious about protecting your apples, you're going to have to trap the starlings. When I used to farm, we had a real problem w/ sparrows and starlings all year round. These trash birds go after loose grain on the ground and can carry diseases detrimental to hogs. Some naturalists don't even like these birds because they crowd out less competitive species. Sparrows were particularly thick at the farm. There were hundreds of them nesting under the eaves of buildings, or anyplace else that was sheltered. I tried trapping them with one of the small box nest type traps and it was a waste of money. I think I caught three birds over several months. Eventually, I bought the type of trap listed in the link below. The trap was very expensive (something like $300 fifteen years ago, and I think that included shipping) but it really worked. It would catch 25-30 sparrows every few days. And the trap never caught non-target birds. Apparently, trapped sparrows and starlings "call" their brethern into the trap. The man who sold it to me said the large size of the trap was the key. The only difference between their sparrow trap and their starling trap was the size of the opening to let the birds in. Starlings are larger birds, and so need a larger opening. Our problem was more with sparrows, so we used the smaller opening. If interested, and you're handy at making things, I can tell you from memory how to build this trap, which was an incredibly simple design. You could probably save a little money building it yourself. Here is a link that might be useful: Sparrow/Starling trap

As long as the hole in 1 1/2, that Starling shouldn't be able to enter the box, so yes, he will probably give up and leave. I had one land on one of my boxes once. The Male bluebird came STRAIGHT at it and flew after it for a little then drove it to the ground. Ours blues can still put up a fight! I've even seen my bluebirds take Tree Swallows to the ground! More than once. Other than the DRST, a BB gun would probably be the only way to end them. I have a BB gun, but it's not sighted the best, and my hands are really unsteady. But Starlings are larger. The problem is, if they recognize the gun, they'll take off! Good luck! ~Tim~

We switched to feeding safflower, thistle and upside down suet feeders along with fruit, jelly and nectar, after our first year living in the country. We moved from the city to a rural area in Wisconsin and decided to put nest boxes out for bluebirds and wrens, our first year we had mostly HS but we also had one set of bluebirds and one set of tree swallows. Before the little ones had a chance to fledge the HS killed them and nested on top of them, we were sick over this. I removed all the nest boxes and started researching on how to keep the non-native and rough birds away. The switch to the foods we place out on our property was the biggest part of not attracting the non-natives and rougher birds. When the HS try to take over the nest boxes in the spring I shoot them, it is the best way to keep them out of the box, plus it gets rid of another non-native invasive bird. I tried removing their nests at first but they are persistent and do not give up until you get rid of them. We now get one or two nesting pair of bluebirds and usually four to five nesting pair of tree swallows and a pair of nesting wrens(all have fledged within the last week and a half) the few starlings that come in the yard to feed on bugs in the grass do not stick around long ( they get shot as well). This is not intended to offend any bird lovers ( we are bird lovers at our house ) it is only to tell how we deal with the invasive non-native birds that are taking over the territory of our native song birds.