Keeping crows away from the car.

[#1]

As I’ve mentioned in another thread I now know that crows are to blame for the wanton vandalism of the car’s windscreen wipers and my camera now tells me that they frequent the car much more often than I thought.

The car can’t go into the garage as there simply isn’t the room so other than the use of a full car cover, can anyone provide a practical solution to keep these bloody creatures off of the car please?

[#2]

Apart from the attraction of the wiper blades... ( remove them when the car is not in use ! )..    cover them with plastic bread bags....

what do you think attracts the crows to the car in the first place?

If you could sort that out, and deal with it... possibly they will go elsewhere. 

Electronically.... -> motion sensor controlled flashing lights ( something akin to the orange warning lights ( or blues and twos)  inside the car, when it is parked up .

Some "kiddies" windmills, placed on bonnet and roof... ?

[#3]

That I can't answer @shutter, from what I've read it may be their reflection that is attracting them so the car's been parked in the opposite direction but this had no effect at all.

[#4]

Crows Magpies and the like seem to have a thing with shiny objects and collecting them. I guess they are looking for a shiny bit they can take away.

So the obvious solution is get rid of the shine. A couple of buckets of dirty muddy water should do it.

[#5]

Good morning Mook 

How about a magnetic windscreen frost cover cut to fit the  lower windscreen to cover just the wipers 

Brian A

[#6]

An old bath towel thrown across the windscreen & wipers,

or a cat, or a shotgun.....

[#7]

@Champnet what about a cat with a shotgun, functional and entertaining as well.

[#8]

@Anonymous 

I wonder if the initial attraction is the cars colour?  Perhaps they see it as some sort of larger black relative?

Perhaps the shotgun suggestion by @Champnet isn't such a bad idea, although an airgun would probably be more practical.

If crows are anything like gulls, shooting one or two of them might deter others.

IME gulls seem to pass 'the knowledge' through the generations that "that is not a good place to try and build a nest" as they haven't picked our roof or chimney for many years now. 

[#9]

@RobPN  Wouldnt a shotgun scratch the paint work on the car. Any way after Chris Packham dont you need a licence to shoot them?

[#10]

You'll need to keep watching and see just what makes the crows keep coming back to your car and then stopping that.

Take a look at your car after you've parked it (or a few hours afterwards) and look at where the wipers are - look for any seeds/insects/anything else that crows might be interested in and remove them.

If they're fixated with the wipers, then cover those up with something.  There are ultrasonic bird scarers for sale, but they appear to be largely useless after the first couple of scares.

Hopefully, if you manage to break their habit in somehow making somewhere else more inviting, then they'll stop visiting your car.

It would be completely unethical to start spreading bird-seed on a neighbour's garden, so I won't suggest you do that.

[#11]

Offer them something else that might attract them. How about a bowl full of silver milk bottles tops?

Oh hang on.... 

You beat me to it @Crunchie !

[#12]

I thought about a toy reclining cat with suckers underneath, stuck to the bonnet.

[#13]

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@TTman wrote:

@RobPN  Wouldnt a shotgun scratch the paint work on the car.

@TTman 

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@RobPN wrote:

... although an airgun would probably be more practical.

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@TTman wrote:

Any way after Chris Packham dont you need a licence to shoot them?

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AIUI it's only ever been possible to shoot them under a licence, but there always used to be a 'General Licence' permitting anybody to kill them for certain reasons such as public health or safety.

Googling finds this and following a link from that page it seems that it is still permitted to shoot crows for those reasons.

WML-GL35- To kill or take certain species of wild birds to preserve public health or public safety

So it could be argued that the owner of the car was being put in danger by being attacked by the birds when trying to scare  them away.  

[#14]

@Strat The cat on the sucker sounds a good idea but you would have to remember to remove it when going out or you could leave a trail of accidents behind you and be surrounded by police cars!!!!

[#15]

Tempting them with some food like seeds etc... made me look up what crows eat... and this came up

Diet. Crows are omnivores, which means they eat nearly anything. Crows eat small animals such as mammals, amphibians, reptiles, eggs and carrion. They also eat insects, seeds, grains, nuts, fruit, non-insect arthropods, mollusks, worms and even other birds.2 May 2017

it does not mention car wiper blades, though...