Crap Update: Snake Failure

Hi John,

How have you been?

I have found that the only thing that keeps the birds off are bird spikes. I bought and installed plastic spikes on the spreaders and mast head and the birds have left me alone ever since. Last year, in September, the spikes on one of the spreaders fell off. The birds got me good after that.

The boat I race on has fishing lines strung from the mast to the spreader. It works, but seems to require lots of adjusting, fixing, re-stringing, etc.

Let me know if you want / need help sending someone up the mast(s) to put lines or spikes up.

Take care,
Barry

The problem seems to be worse some years that others. This is a bad year. Spikes work, although I haven't had a problem with birds landing on spreaders. They'd land on the crane at the mast head, bending the Windex. I put spikes there. This year they've been perching on the boom, so I've run fishing line from the mast to the backstay so it's about 6" off the boom. That works.

Then they started landing in the cockpit itself, which they've never done before (like I said - a bad year). With lifelines all around, I thought they wouldn't do that. Now I string several lines around the cockpit to discourage them. That worked, but is a PITA to remove and restring every time.

Then they landed on the Raydome, which is mounted on the backstay, so they're cr*pping on the helm seat. This is a good location for spikes if I can find a way to adhere them to the top. I rigged some temporarily with cable ties running all around the dome, but they won't withstand a blow. I also ran some long cable ties around the dome and put some short ties around the long ones, sticking up to act as spikes. Does anyone have ideas about how to mount them more permanently on the top of the dome?

TIA