On 4/27/2010 12:42 PM, mike wrote:
Every morning shortly after dawn, a big black bird does a
woodpecker imitation on my metal roof vent. Of course,
he picks the one that vents the bathrooms, so the racket
reverberates all over the house...and wakes the dead...that'd
be me...
He pecks, looks around, repeats a few times then moves on to
the next house.
Suspect he's marking his territory.

I'm in the city, so the obvious solution involving lead projectiles
is not an option.

How do I scare him off? I'm not above killing the little pecker.
A sound-activated stun gun sounds like a fun project.
Suggestions?
We had the same problem for several years until we finally found a solution.
Our offender WAS a woodpecker. As I understand it, they are not only marking
their territory, they are trying to get small insects under the flashing and the
edges of the adjacent shingles to reveal themselves so that the bird can have
breakfast.

Our solution after the first time it happened last year was to use some home and
garden insect spray in the immediate area. After a few days of getting no
further reward for its efforts, the bird gave up and went in search of another
place to find food.

If you don't have access to the roof, you may just have to wait it out. In our
experience, if you do nothing, the bird will stop after a month or so when it
gets too hot on the roof for the insects to survive the intense mid-day sun.