How Sad ... am sorry you lost fish, especially koi.
A fellow in my pond club wants to know the success
rate of ScareCrows ... I will tell your story

Nedra
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Pines/4836
http://community.webshots.com/user/nedra118
"joe" wrote in message
...
Nedra wrote:

I'd like to know if the ScareCrow is effective against birds?
If yes, How Long does it remain effective?

Let me tell you my tale.

About three weeks after having put in our pond last year, we were sitting
on
the patio next to it, enjoying a margarita. My SO's eyes suddenly doubled
in
diameter, and before I could ask what was wrong, a giant bird flew by us
not
three feet away. It landed in the canyon next to us and stood there,
eyeing
us, for about a half an hour. Heron. Huge - amazing. We ordered a
scarecrow
the same day.

Before it arrived we saw the bird a few more times. I work at home so I
was
always able to chase him off, although what I would have done if he didn't
fly away always sat in the back of my mind. Anyway, scarecrow arrived and
was installed.

It seemed to be pretty effective. Didn't lose a fish although we did get
wet
on occasion when we forgot to turn it off.

A few months later, we were out of town. Our house sitter called and said
the scarecrow wasn't working right. I had him replace the battery. By the
time we returned we had lost 3 Koi. It didn't need batteries. I took it
apart and cleaned it. It worked fine again for a month.

Bought more Koi.

The scarecrow started to go off, then not turn off. Fearing a flood we
turned it off. A visit to the web site said that some units had bad
solenoids and they would replace them. So I emailed them at the address
provided and waited. Nothing came. Mean while, all Koi were gone. There
weren't that many, nor were they large or expensive, but they were mine
damn
it.

I called them. They seemed surprised they didn't get the email. They
mailed
me the part and I repaired it. Now seems to work fine, although we have
pretty much decided that we'll just keep goldfish and let the heron be our
population control.

In short, I'd say they work fine - as long as they are working. Perhaps
having two would be a better solution.

Joe



-----= Posted via Newsfeeds.Com, Uncensored Usenet News =-----
http://www.newsfeeds.com - The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World!
-----== Over 80,000 Newsgroups - 16 Different Servers! =-----