Seeing beautiful birds around your balcony can be a delightful sight, but the repeated presence of pigeons can bring frustration because of their mess. Their droppings can damage our porch, balcony, and garden furniture, and not only this, but their droppings can also cause health-related problems. It may seem like an ordinary task, but pigeons are not as easy to get rid of as it looks because they have developed a homing instinct, and even if you try some of the methods, they can always come back.

8 ways of getting rid of pigeons from roofs and balconies

Many of us wonder about how to keep pigeons away from our roofs and balconies. Below, we have enlisted some of the best possible solutions that you can choose according to what suits you the most.

   1. Bird spikes

Among the most common and useful ways to get rid of pigeons around your balconies is using bird spikes on their roosting and landing spots. These bird spikes do not hurt the birds in any way, and they are only to make the roosting areas unpleasant. These spikes act as a visual and physical barrier for the pigeons and restrict them to land in the desired places. These bird spikes can be placed anywhere because their base is flexible. You can easily find these bird spikes in any hardware store around you.

   2. Bird wires

Using bird wires is another alternative that you can use in perching areas of pigeons. These bird wires have nylon coating on them, which makes them almost invisible. You can use bird wires in places where the bird spikes might not be suitable. In the house fronts where you do not want bird spikes to spoil your balcony’s beauty, this might be an even better solution. Bird wires are generally used for leveled surfaces because you have to maintain a uniform gap between the surface and the wire. Any irregularities would make bird wires less effective.

   3. Gel repellents or deterrents

If you don’t want to use bird spikes, bird slides, or bird coils, as they might spoil the beauty of your balcony, you can use gel repellents instead. These gel repellents or deterrents are applied on the perching areas of the pigeons. These gel repellents have a sticky surface, which makes the pigeons find someplace else to roost. This gel is not harmful to the pigeons, but other smaller birds can get stuck on it and eventually die. These gel repellents might not work for very long because the gel’s stickiness might wear off due to dust, making reapplication necessary to make them effective again. 

   4. Sealing off entrances with meshes 

Filling gaps and sealing off any entrance where pigeons can stay is another way of making your rooftops pigeon free. You can do this by removing the nests and then applying meshes on any cavities where pigeons can roost, especially the chimneys and air conditioning outdoor units. This is one of the humane ways of getting rid of the pigeon problems without harming them. Making the roosting spaces unavailable for them would force them to relocate to some other place. 

   5. Reflective surfaces

Pigeons can easily be scared off using any reflective surface. There are several visual deterrents for pigeons available in the market. The most common ones are the reflective discs, which can be easily hanged in balconies and gardens. Besides the reflective discs, you can use almost any reflective material, such as reflective tapes that can be hanged freely to get rid of pigeons around your balcony.

    6. Scare pigeon

Another type of visual deterrent a scare pigeon to make your balcony pigeon free. You can get a plastic owl from the market and place it near the perching areas of the pigeons. Besides plastic owls, you can also use a rubber snake for this. Using these alternatives is only effective for the short term as pigeons might get used to the presence of these scare pigeons.  

    7. Ultrasonic repellents

Using ultrasonic repellents to get rid of the pigeons on your balcony and rooftops is another modern solution. Birds can hear sounds that are of greater frequency, and these ultrasonic repellents take advantage of this. These devices play sounds of distress calls and sounds of their predators, which scare them away. It is effortless to set them up on your balcony or at any place. These ultrasonic repellents have a better range but are costly as compared to other alternatives. 

    8. Shock repellents

Shock repellents give a mild shock to the birds that land on them without killing them. This method is highly effective in terms of keeping the pigeons away from rooftop perching areas. This can get costly as it requires professional assistance for installation.