Starling Shooting

[Freudianfloyd]

Growing up at the grandparent's farmhouse, I was awakened every morning by the sound of a shotgun blast outside my bedroom window. My grandpa had lots of trouble with starlings building nests in the eaves of the old farmhouse, and he was always worried about fires. He made it a point to shoot any and all that tried to get into his house. When I got a little more experience hunting, and would go over to visit him, he would hand me his 1100 and a 3 shotgun shells and tell me that I need to come back with 3 starlings. I got pretty good at it, but never could hit him like he did.

After getting married, having my own family, and my own guns, I made it a point to visit often with my own shotgun and my own box of shells, and take out as many as I could. They are plentiful for sure.

Fast forward a few years, and my wife and I bought the old farm. We attempted to save the old farmhouse, but between termites, old age, and just a rough life, the house could not be saved. When the house was torn down, we could see the walls and attic full of large starling nests. I always thought he just liked shooting them, but he was right, they were turning his house into a giant fire hazard.

My wife and I have since built a new house on the farm. A big white one just like the old one, and sitting in the same spot. Well the starlings must think the old house is back, because they are everywhere. I haven't seen any get into the soffit or eaves yet, but I'm ready. Since it has warmed up here, I have been trying to make it a point to go out in the mornings on my days off and shoot a few. And honestly, I think I prefer "hunting" starlings to just about anything else.

They are plentiful, you don't need to spend big money on equipment, you don't need to wear camo, they come to you, and you don't have to clean them. You can also make as much noise as you want.

I shot two earlier today as they were coming in to the tree next to the house, and I took my son out for the first time with his own shotgun, and he got one.

They are a blast to shoot, they are tricky enough to hit that they keep your skills sharp, and you usually don't have to wait long for them to come in. On any given day, I see hundreds of them in the fields. I pick off the ones that come to the house.

Anybody else dealing with these? I never hear anybody else in my area that shoot them, even though they are considered a pest and season is open year round.

 

[Savage30L]

I tried doing that when I was a teenager, back in the mid-70s, for the same reason as your grandpa, here in KY. I just gave up eventually because I was overwhelmed by the numbers....there aren't enough shotgun shells out there...

 

[nettlle]

Starlings are like moles. Nature has an inexhaustible supply.

 

[Armored farmer]

We had cattle up until I graduated high school. We had cow/calf and fed the calves to market. We always had creep feeders and the starlings would help themselves to the free smorgasbord.
They made a mess of the feeders and the water tank.
My dad taught me to take a shotgun and Crack open the door of the barn and shoot a pattern about 30 yds awsy.... into the snow or mud.....then scatter feed exactly where the pattern of shot marked the ground. Then hide inside the barn door and when the starlings gather on the scattered feed.......

Sometimes you could collect a half dozen with one shot....
Maybe not too sporting, but much more entertaining than fishing a drowned starling out of the water tank. Apparently they can only tread water for a day or two.

 

[.308 Norma]

Anybody else dealing with these?

There aren't enough of them around here to make the kind of messes like you're having to deal with. However, there's enough of them here to eat the currants in bushes out behind the garden so that I won't have any of my wife's homemade currant jelly (my favorite) next fall and winter.
As I've said before on THR, my Sheridan Blue Streak .20 caliber pellet rifle works on them. Or, sometimes when I really want to make a mess of a starling, I'll shoot it with my .17 HMR "Handy Rifle."
The only thing about using my .17 HMR though is that the currant bushes are only about 30 yards from our rear deck, while our largest apple tree (which the danged starlings also like) is 85 or 90 yards. So, when the wind's blowing (which is most of the time here) the starlings in the apple tree are relatively safe.
I want to vent just a little bit though - my loving wife (of almost 53 years BTW) puts out wild bird food. And those darned starlings like that stuff just as much as all of the wild birds my wife likes having around!
Oh well. I guess I should just think of that wild bird food my wife puts out as starling bait. Because, using my Sheridan Blue Streak and sitting on the rear deck, I can easily reach the places my wife puts the food.

 

[Varminterror]

I spent most of my childhood walking around my family farm with a Crosman 760 Pumpmaster shooting starlings and pigeons like it was my full time job. I remember opening new 10,000 round bottles of copper plated BB's every spring, dripping in a few drops of motor oil and shaking them to distribute, then burning as many of them into starlings and pigeons as possible. I knocked out thousands of these sky-rats over the years, taking my BB rifle along every morning and evening when I did the farmyard chores. It did largely pay off, we had a much greater population of chickadee's, sparrows, and nuthatches, as well as robins, cardinals, and mourning doves around the farm than most places around us, and WAY less piles of starling and pigeon @&%$ in our barns under rafters and door headers. The advantage, of course, for the multi-pump 760 was the opportunity to control the horsepower behind the BB, so I didn't perforate the barn roofs, but could still knock down a pigeon with a well placed shot to the head.

I'll readily admit that I did rankle my dad and grandpa by knocking down a handful, or maybe several handfuls of harmless sparrows which they found to be more favorable - but I couldn't help but occasionally challenge my marksmanship skills with their smaller size.

 

[Hugger-4641]

Growing up at the grandparent's farmhouse, I was awakened every morning by the sound of a shotgun blast outside my bedroom window. My grandpa had lots of trouble with starlings building nests in the eaves of the old farmhouse, and he was always worried about fires. He made it a point to shoot any and all that tried to get into his house. When I got a little more experience hunting, and would go over to visit him, he would hand me his 1100 and a 3 shotgun shells and tell me that I need to come back with 3 starlings. I got pretty good at it, but never could hit him like he did.

After getting married, having my own family, and my own guns, I made it a point to visit often with my own shotgun and my own box of shells, and take out as many as I could. They are plentiful for sure.

Fast forward a few years, and my wife and I bought the old farm. We attempted to save the old farmhouse, but between termites, old age, and just a rough life, the house could not be saved. When the house was torn down, we could see the walls and attic full of large starling nests. I always thought he just liked shooting them, but he was right, they were turning his house into a giant fire hazard.

My wife and I have since built a new house on the farm. A big white one just like the old one, and sitting in the same spot. Well the starlings must think the old house is back, because they are everywhere. I haven't seen any get into the soffit or eaves yet, but I'm ready. Since it has warmed up here, I have been trying to make it a point to go out in the mornings on my days off and shoot a few. And honestly, I think I prefer "hunting" starlings to just about anything else.

They are plentiful, you don't need to spend big money on equipment, you don't need to wear camo, they come to you, and you don't have to clean them. You can also make as much noise as you want.

I shot two earlier today as they were coming in to the tree next to the house, and I took my son out for the first time with his own shotgun, and he got one.

They are a blast to shoot, they are tricky enough to hit that they keep your skills sharp, and you usually don't have to wait long for them to come in. On any given day, I see hundreds of them in the fields. I pick off the ones that come to the house.

Anybody else dealing with these? I never hear anybody else in my area that shoot them, even though they are considered a pest and season is open year round.

Yes, I've taken out about a dozen so far this year. I have a couple very very small gaps between the metal roof on my house and the metal trim pieces on the corners and those buggers are able to get in them. I keep a 12ga pump over the side door and a .410 bolt action at the back door where my deck is. I can hit them flying better with the .410 but I can blast them out of trees 50yds away with the 12ga or my Henry .22lr. I've pretty well eliminated them from three corners but the SE corner is the hardest for me to cover and there's still at least 2 pairs I'm trying to get

 

[Armored farmer]

Starlings are constantly building nests around the farm. If a tractor sits for a day or two....when you start it up, it poops a big wad of hay out the exhaust pipe.
If you turn on an auger, it poops out a wad of hay into your truck bed.
When you open a big sliding door on the shed. They have built in the door track. As you're shoving it open a big wad of hay falls down your neck.
Worst of all....they sit on the tomato cages and pull the branches off my young tomato plants!
That is a declaration of WAR. No more air rifles or 22s. No sporty .410s.... It's a full choke 12ga 1100 and trap loads and no mercy.
Feathered rats....they are.

 

[usaral63]

Grew up-m in W.Va during the 50's, we lived on the fringe of a small town and kept a garden.......well, we tried, those Starlings would lay waste to tomatos and the plants just as AF describes. I acquired a crossman c02 in .22 so as to not overly disturb our elderly neighbors and that served as a usable deterrent.....but, my best solution was to bait 'em during late winter. We had a large old two story home and both my folks worked which afforded me a lot of free time, I'd bait those birds with bread when the snow as on and shoot down from our 2nd story........killed a bushel basket full on a good day, but some always flew away....My dad then got a visit from the local Methodist minister that asked him to have me knock it off as his church grounds (about a 1/8th of a mile away) was littered with dead and dying flyaway's I'd wounded, and all the while I thought I was rendering a public service.

 

[buck460XVR]

Lawn rats. As a kid they kept me out of BBs and pellets most of the summer. Discovered early on that dead birds made great decoys.

 

[.308 Norma]

Lawn rats. As a kid they kept me out of BBs and pellets most of the summer. Discovered early on that dead birds made great decoys.

What are lawn rats? We have ground squirrels, rock chucks (Yellow-bellied marmots), golfers and voles (field mice) around here. I've never heard any of them called "lawn rats" though.
BTW, I didn't know it until a couple of years ago, but the darned ground squirrels (they're "Belling Ground Squirrels" around here, I think) are cannibalistic. If you shoot one, and then just stand and wait for a little while, pretty soon another will pop up out of his hole, and either drag the dead one away - or start eating on him right there. My wife and I have each piled up as many as three that way.

 

[slicksleeve]

harmless sparrows

My grandad was a chicken farmer, and had the long broiler houses. Sparrows would get in and nest in the insulation. We hunted them with a .22 rifle and rat shot. A bullet would shoot through the roof, and the only other gun he owned was a .410 shotgun, which would do too much damage to the insulation.

 

[Jim Watson]

Starlings are constantly building nests around the farm. If a tractor sits for a day or two....when you start it up, it poops a big wad of hay out the exhaust pipe.

I was on a project with an air separation plant, big compressors for air and the produced oxygen and nitrogen. They had vent valves and stacks so the cylinders could depressurize when shut down. The horizontal stacks had a deflector plate spaced out in line with the pipe so any debris would not be shot across the plant. Yup, starling nests are debris and they deflect quickly and messily.

 

[archeryrob]

Old farmer wife told me they used to have a window box for a bird feeder with an inside and outside door. When starlings were in the box they shut the outside, opened inside and dispatched bird. Saved breast and make starling or black bird pie. They let the other birds go.

Another old lady I used to sit on the porch with would scatter bird seed and draw in birds and pigeons. Once used to it, she would soak seed in vodva, dry slightly and they toss it out. Once bids were drunk and couldn't fly she would gather up all the pigeons and let the other birds sober up.

 

[mm93]

I used to shoot them with a pellet rifle around our small farm house. Then the next door neighbor showed me a trick he used. He was a well driller and said starlings love to nest in his well pipe. So he got a 10' stick of schedule 40 PVC and leaned it up against a tree so one end was on the ground, and the other open. The starlings went into the 4" PVC pipe and slid to the bottom unable to get out. He simply raised the pipe up and grabbed them one at a time to wring their necks. Sometimes he'd find as many as 6-7 at one time! I tried it, but never had more than 3-4 at a time.
Didn't put much of a dent in the population, but it was cheaper and easier. Plus no chance of shooting the house or shop either.

 

[Savage30L]

I used to shoot them with a pellet rifle around our small farm house. Then the next door neighbor showed me a trick he used. He was a well driller and said starlings love to nest in his well pipe. So he got a 10' stick of schedule 40 PVC and leaned it up against a tree so one end was on the ground, and the other open. The starlings went into the 4" PVC pipe and slid to the bottom unable to get out. He simply raised the pipe up and grabbed them one at a time to wring their necks. Sometimes he'd find as many as 6-7 at one time! I tried it, but never had more than 3-4 at a time.
Didn't put much of a dent in the population, but it was cheaper and easier. Plus no chance of shooting the house or shop either.

This is one of those "why didn't I think of that" ideas.

 

[codytrucker]

I used to shoot them with a pellet rifle around our small farm house. Then the next door neighbor showed me a trick he used. He was a well driller and said starlings love to nest in his well pipe. So he got a 10' stick of schedule 40 PVC and leaned it up against a tree so one end was on the ground, and the other open. The starlings went into the 4" PVC pipe and slid to the bottom unable to get out. He simply raised the pipe up and grabbed them one at a time to wring their necks. Sometimes he'd find as many as 6-7 at one time! I tried it, but never had more than 3-4 at a time.
Didn't put much of a dent in the population, but it was cheaper and easier. Plus no chance of shooting the house or shop either.

I made a deal like that , but where they fell down into a wire cage at the bottom . I also made a little trap for sparrows that used tin can open on both ends balanced on a lever next to a feeding shelf so when they hopped in it to get the food it went down into a cage and they stepped out into it and the can went back up and waited for the next one . It worked pretty slick , except we have some little red headed finches that seemed to think it was a free ride at a carnival , let them out and half hour later they are in there again ! A bigger one would probably work good for starlings .

 

[JmacD]

Had an uncle that loaded up some big 10 guage loads with like 9 shot… and the number of starlings that would rain from the trees with one shot was amazing. My BB gun claimed its share. I’m now head of maintenance at our church camp, and what a MESS they make!!!

 

[jmorris]

Oh, you reminded me of when my Father and I killed 123 sparrows (3 accomplices out front with trash bags did the counting) out of the sycamore trees out front, from the backyard, with 25 shells.

He made a number of attempts, before cutting them down, to run them off. Some pretty entertaining. They never did gather like that in the pecans...

 

[HB]

Does anybody know the origin story of the European starling in the americas?

Supposedly they were introduced by a director of a Shakespeare play. He felt they added to a scene and night after night he released them over a summer. Now, they are one of the most numerous birds in North America.

 

[Jim Watson]

The version I once read was that he imported every bird mentioned in Shakespeare but the starling was the only one to catch on.

Then there is the story of the Mobile tycoon who imported nightingales. One evening he was listening to the birdsong and commented to the butler that the nightingales sure had multiplied fast. "Boss those are the mocking birds that have learned the nightingale song."

 

[hso]

we could see the walls and attic full of large starling nests.

As you saw, harassing and shooting them won't work. They have dealt with predators since as long as they've been a species. They'll wait in the trees until you step inside to pee, go to work/school/etc, or otherwise make themselves scarce while you are standing right there...and come in droves when you aren't.

There are a variety mesh and metal products sold to keep them out of the house and others to repel them from the eaves that are more effective since those are 24/7 solutions.

Baiting them away from the building and then shooting them at least baits they away from the house, but doesn't dent the population.

 

[Random 8]

They are one of my favorite springtime activities with the 22. We have a large cottonwood that they like to perch in the tippy top branches. Makes for challenging targets with the. 22. Best not miss either, they are fast learners.

 

[foxmeadow]

A nearby dairy had (has) s huge problems with starlings roosting in the cow barns and causing considerable damage. I was invited to shoot some by a friend who was a master trap and skeet shooter in his day. He told me to bring at least four boxes of ammo. Once darkness started, a single starling flew toward the barn and was handily dispatched. Behind him came 2, then 5 or 6, then 40 or 50, then a cloud of birds you could barely see through. I went through all four boxes of ammo in about 15 minutes or so. I'd never fired a shotgun so much that the barrel would leave burn marks on your skin if your touched it.
The cows were not bothered at all. I stood about 20 feet from a well attended feed trough and saw no reaction to all the thunder of 3 guns.
The most fun I've ever had with a shotgun...

 

[Steve in NC]

Oh the memories with my dad's JC Higgins single shot 22 shooting starlings. We were not farmers but surrounded by diary farms. That was my marksmanship training shooting those sorry rascals. Yes they would try to get into our eves also.
I shot them out of every window in the house, walking the hedgerows of the fields, then I learned how to climbs the wrought iron posts of the front porch and sit on the roof (... it was only a 12/3 or 12/4 pitch) with a brick of 22 shells. I killed a ton of them and they just kept coming. I could shoot almost 360 degrees and not have to worry about a backstop. We could see one of the farm houses down in the valley. That was my only "no shoot" zone.

Great times with that old rifle.
Steve