Those of you who have read my diary for a while will be aware that we have a very persistent crow that came to annoy us last year and has been with us ever since. The problem is that it pecks on the landing window every morning from first light and of course the mornings are getting lighter, so that currently means around 5am! Anyway, we had tried all the usual tricks, anti-bird strips, something in the window to stop it seeing its reflection, bird of prey prints on the windows to scare it off, Aristotle jumping out at it. All the things you’d expect.
Nothing worked. Our Master asked if it was ok for him to get a shotgun and whilst the idea is becoming ever more tempting, not only would that be illegal but our Mistress is pretty much against guns and violence in general. She is a light sleeper so has been the one to suffer most, although as it sets us barking sometimes anyone in the vicinity would probably rather the crow went away. Last November, our Mistress hit on a new idea. She saw a wonderful garden ornament of an owl when she was in Belgium and brought it home with the intention of affixing it to the porch roof. It sat in our kitchen for several months as she could not work out how to put it up safely so it didn’t fall down and risk causing serious injury to someone other than the crow. Anyway, to cut a long story a little less long, she co-opted a local builder on the project and, despite his suggestion of getting a shotgun, he came up with a way to fix it in place and here it is. Whether it stops the crow remains to be seen, but it looks quite nice and we’ll know the answer if it comes up as a future village treasure hunt question!
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