NA- #$%& Birds

[Cap'n Jack]

I haven't used my grill in 2 weeks. Open it up and find the nest in the picture.

It was sitting on top of the grates. It took me an hour to get all the junk out, enlisted the aid of a shop vac. #$#% bird got under the cover and I suppose through the holes for the rotisserie. Also had the clean the bird s#!+ off the shelves on the sode of the grill.

Good thing it wasn't a plane with a nest, I suppose.

 

[mikea]

We had a live hornet's nest in ours. Used to 30 feet away bug spray all over. After I moved everything we watched as one soldier came back and kept circling the empty space where the nest was. That was amazing.

I hit a pothole last night in the mini-van and blew the tire. When we lowered the spare, see saw that the wheel was also full of bedding like that, but that may have been meeses, and could been there for years.

An hour?

My CFI told me once a few years ago that he and student left one of the Warriors and went into the office to finish the paperwork. He happened to see a bird fly by. When he and the next student went to the plane maybe 20 minutes later they found a nest well along under the cowl.

 

[Cap'n Jack]

We had a live hornet's nest in ours. Used to 30 feet away bug spray all over. After I moved everything we watched as one soldier came back and kept circling the empty space where the nest was. That was amazing.

They do home pretty well. And they can be big pests.

An hour?

I wanted to make sure that someone other than me would want to eat out of the thing.

I also wanted to make sure there wasn't grass plugging the gas jets, and there wasn't any grass that would catch on fire.

 

[colomtnflyer]

While instructing in KCOS one spring, I finished a flight and went inside to debrief the student, pre-brief the next, and went back out to preflight for the next hop.
As with all my preflights, a check inside the cowling both visually and (if the engine was cool enough) by reaching into the areas that could not be seen. In this instance, in less than 45 minutes, an almost completed nest was found.
I kept the nest in a box to show future students. I'd ask them how long they thought it would take a determined bird to make this nest... Most would guess 2 hrs or more... When told it was just under 45 minutes, they were incredulous! It gave them all a reinforced purpose to their preflights.

 

[terzap]

It is nesting season--cover up your openings with fine mesh screen, or hang fringes of flashing mylar streamers (preferably red/silver) that will move and sparkle in the wind. Male House Sparrows freak out at moving red objects, also some females. Starlings also dislike the red/silver flashes. They'll look elsewhere. I lived with a human imprinted house sparrow and learned a lot from him that I put to good use on those I didn't want nesting beneath the eaves of my apartment.

 

[lprellwitz]

Need to watch for birds in the air as well. Coming back home today, making a landing at Lafayette, we were about 4 miles out. Heard someone closer in call a bird strike - they were quickly cleared to land.

 

[JRitt]

I found my grill full to the top with a bird nest along with 3 eggs this weekend also. I have not cleaned it out yet because my son started crying because I was going to kill the unborn birds.

 

[mikea]

I found my grill full to the top with a bird nest along with 3 eggs this weekend also. I have not cleaned it out yet because my son started crying because I was going to kill the unborn birds.

I had no problem throwing the nests, eggs and all, I removed from on top of cabinet behind my plane into the trash.

Just fire up the grill and treat the kid to very small hard boiled eggs.