Thank you! I'm saving this info so I can do this sometime in the Spring, whenever the weather decides to warm up :) !! pkponder ...do you have a picture? Would love to see it. I want to include a Birdhouse and a Birdfeeder. My Birdfeeder is very large and I hung it last summer and was still out till recently when it needed seed and found out the thing broke at the top where you take it off to add seed ... so I'm mounting it on a pole and it will be just fine that way. It is VERY heavy so I can't have a tall pole for it. I included a picture of my bird feeder. It is 13 x 13 and has 9 feeding stations, 11lb capacity. I want to have a birdhouse separate but not too far away. Have an idea to put these alongside our ramp ... will look nice with some vines I think. :) Also, I know this bird feeder can be pole mounted because a couple people told me about how to do it. I saved that info and it says The pipe needs to be no wider than 7/8 of an inch. Anyway, looking forward to mounting that and I have to find a nice bird house to also mount on a pole. We have lots of cats around here (including ours that goes outside) and squirrels, so I might have to figure a way to keep them out.

Love it,hope you get a cup and saucer up there with it,that would look so good :) Did you make the bench from a chair or a headboard? I really like it a lot! Everything looks great :)

sharpgirl, I can only share my experience w/ BB. For several years I put up houses built (I thought) to BB specs. No takers. And because I had seen BB on my farm I knew they were around, but I didn't know where they were nesting. Until one day I noticed that the 'fake' hollow owl I had attached to the roof peak of my small barn, had BB's coming and going around it. BB's had pecked a hole in the chest of owl and apparently built a nest inside. This is now the 2nd year that they're nesting there. Their nest is about 15-18 ft. off ground, 100 ft. from a feeder but hidden by a bldg., hole faces South, slightly southeast. BB's perch on barn roof before they enter the hole. Both male and female feed the babies. Area of nest is surrounded by either mowed pasture or lawn. No close trees for 50-60 ft. I overflow a large watering trough (for horse) several times a day and the BB's show up to bathe and frolic in the water, if it's warm outside. So my bluebirds outsmarted me and made their own personalized nest and they must like it cause they've returned this year. Good Luck with attracting your own BB's. PS/I'm in zone 9B Central Fl.

I'm glad your bird problem turned out to be seasonal but just in case you ever face this problem again (or any bird infestation problem) I thought it might be helpful to just mention a different angle on this. The problem is not that the birds are pooping (or whatever they're doing) in your pool. That is simply a symptom of your real problem: that your environment is attractive to birds. If you really want to keep birds from being destructive to your property you have to make it so that your land is a place they don't want to hang out on in the first place. There are a lot of different approaches to this but yes, stopping the food supply is one of them. Another would be the mylar balloons someone else mentioned up above. There are also specialized bird scare balloons with 'eyes' that follow the birds wherever they fly as well as holographic tape. These incorporate movement so they are usually more affective than static decoys. There are other senses to attack as well: taste/smell, touch, and hearing. Birds hate methyl anthranilate (a chemical derived from concord grapes that has long been used for grape flavoring)--it gives them a similar sensation to what we feel when we encounter bleach. This comes in commercially available sprays. Also, there are sticky gels, netting, or spike strips that keep birds from roosting on certain surfaces. Lastly, there are sound devices that utilize recordings of predators/distress calls that scare birds away. For a partially or fully enclosed area you could use an ultrasonic device as well (one that can't be heard by humans but is annoying to birds and bats). Make sure that you switch up whatever you use from time to time. If you use balloons, move the location (but always keep it near where the birds are nesting). If you're using a sound device change the interval between effects, try to randomize the effects being used. Also, using the products together in a synergistic way will create a more effective and longer-lasting reaction. I'm glad to hear that no one has mentioned killing or injuring the birds...don't do that. As mentioned before that would be reacting to the symptoms rather than truly solving the problem. Furthermore, it would be very easy to accidentally tamper with one of the MANY birds protected by the Migratory Bird Act of 1918 (and then you'd be in big trouble). Just a side note: be careful when cleaning up the bird poop. Birds can transmit over 60 diseases to humans. Some of them are fatal. Bird dropping particles can be unknowingly inhaled and lead to serious health problems. Good luck in your future bird encounters! Here is a link that might be useful: click for examples, case studies and FAQs about bird pest control