Can Avian Control® get rid of birds in dairy barns, sheds and other structures?

Absolutely! Avian Control® Bird Repellent is highly recommended for removing unwanted birds from dairy barns, storage and packing sheds and other non-inhabited structures. Simply spray or fog undiluted Avian Control® onto areas that birds are using to roost or loaf.

Application is recommended at sunrise. Open an easy exit for the birds and begin to spray or fog Avian Control®. This is a behavior changing process, so two or three applications may be necessary to break birds of their habit of occupying the structure. Treatments should be 5 to 7 days apart for maximum effectiveness. Re-treatments should be done as soon as new birds begin to re-occupy the building.

Can I “tank mix” mix Avian Control® with other agricultural chemicals?

Yes. Avian Control® may be “tank mixed” with other agricultural chemicals but “acidic” pesticides and fungicides may lessen its effectiveness. Applying Avian Control® alone is recommended.

How long does Avian Control® last and will rain wash it away?

Avian Control® can last from 10 to 14 days depending upon the frequency and severity of local rain. Experience has shown that an application interval of 10 days is ideal for most crops. Avian Control® is resistant to irrigation and most light to moderate rains. Very heavy rains may wash Avian Control® off of your plants and will require re-application.

How much Avian Control® do I use and how do I apply it?

Apply Avian Control® at the rate of 16 ounces to 40 ounces per acre. Set your air blast or boom sprayer to apply 20 to 100 gallons of water per acre (a light mist) and make sure that your holding tank has internal agitation. Avian Control® should be applied to the entire plant and fruit acreage, not just the perimeter. Product that drips off the plants onto the ground has no effect on birds. A spreader or sticker is not necessary with Avian Control® and, in some cases, may reduce its effectiveness.

What crops are Avian Control® approved for?

Avian Control® is registered with the US EPA for use on the following crops: cherries, blueberries, strawberries, grapes, apples, stone fruit (apricots cherries, peaches, plums) cereal grains (sweet and pop corn, millet, oats, sorghum) and sunflowers. See product label for details.

What types of birds does Avian Control® work on?

All Birds! Avian Control® has been demonstrated in numerous third-party field tests and university studies to repel nuisance birds such as starlings, blackbirds and grackles. All birds share a common pain nerve, the trigeminal nerve, and Avian Control® is designed to irritate this nerve when birds come into contact with the product through inhalation, preening, ingestion and even through their feet. Birds can never develop a tolerance to Avian Control®, ensuring that it will continue to be effective in the future.

Why don’t propane cannons, statues, kites, mylar ribbons and lasers work?

Birds learn very quickly where there is a dangerous or unpleasant situation and where they may be at ease. This process is called “habituation”. Birds quickly learn that the loud bang of a propane cannon causes no harm to them and they will even perch on the cannon while it continues to discharge, irritating you and your neighbors but not the birds. The same “habituation” occurs with statues, kites, mylar ribbons and lasers. Birds quickly learn that these irritants are neither harmful nor dangerous and the effect wears off quickly. Scarecrows didn’t work in the old days and they still don’t work today.

Why is Avian Control® different from other liquid bird repellents?

The invention of Avian Control® Bird Repellent was the result of years of research and testing. Existing bird repellents were tested, analyzed for their shortcomings and, as a result, Avian Enterprises LLC designed a revolutionary new bird repellent that delivers the level of repellency that was missing from previous products.

Avian Control® was registered with the US EPA in 2010, allowing us to take advantage of the most recent advances in bird repellent chemistry and the study of bird behavior. Older versions of liquid bird repellents were made with extract from concord grapes and were less than totally effective and didn’t last very long, only two or three days.

Avian Control® uses synthetically derived, food grade ingredients that have been optimized to overcome the shortcomings of previous products. Avian Control® has a more sound molecular structure than previous products, making it a more effective repellent. It is resistant to both biological and ultraviolet degradation and marks the treated crops with an infrared stain that warns approaching birds that the crops have been treated. Other chemical bird repellents require 5 gallons/acre per application of their product or more. Avian Control® only requires a rate of 16-40 oz/acre to achieve excellent results.

Why not just use netting to keep birds away?

Netting is an effective method for keeping birds away from your crops but it has several drawbacks. It is is a very expensive capital investment, it requires a great deal of labor to install and in many cases, birds will sit on the netting, leaving behind a mess on your fruit. Also, once one small area of netting is breached, birds will find their way into the entire field.

Why should you use Avian Control® Bird Repellent?

Every year a large percentage of the nation’s crops are lost to foraging birds. Although many remedies (such as netting, older generation chemical repellents, pyrotechnics, and scarecrows) have been tried, nothing works as effectively and economically as Avian Control® Bird Repellent. This new EPA registered and patented bird repellent will protect crops from bird damage, which in turn will boost fruit and berry growers’ crop yields and profits. Avian Control® acts as an irritant to birds only, allowing us to focus on the repellency effect where it is needed. This feature allows Avian Control® to be used in the presence of humans, domestic animals and livestock with confidence and with no harm.

Why won’t Avian Control® alter the taste of wine grapes or other crops?

There has been much discussion of bird repellents containing methyl anthranilate (the chemical extracted from Concord grapes) causing a “foxy” odor. Although methyl anthranilate, the active ingredient in Avian Control® Bird Repellent, has been often mentioned as a possible offending compound, tests have actually shown that ethyl-3 mercaptopropionate is most likely responsible for the peculiar “foxy” odor sometimes found in Concord grapes. Ethyl-3-mercaptopropionate is a sulfur smelling compound, reminiscent of onions or garlic. Methyl anthranilate has a minty or floral odor that is also present in many other plants such as citrus, jasmine, and apples.

Reports and testing done prior to the introduction of Avian Control® are correct in suggesting that methyl anthranilate based repellents can alter the taste of wine grapes. The reason for this change of taste is due to inert ingredients used in earlier generation methyl anthranilate based bird repellents. These inert ingredients are responsible for the translocation of methyl anthranilate from the outer skin of the fruit into the fruit body itself, thereby altering the taste of the wine grape. This characteristic also greatly reduces the effectiveness of the repellent. Avian Control® Bird Repellent does not contain any of these offending inert ingredients. Therefore, all of the repellent remains on the skin of the fruit, where it is available to repel birds and does not translocate into the plant or its fruit, preserving the natural taste of the crop. Additionally, due to both ultraviolet and microbiological degradation, little or no repellent remains present at harvest.

Several tests over the past growing seasons on high quality white and red grapes have shown no interference in the fermentation process and no difference in taste of the finished wine made from treated grapes and untreated grapes.